THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 


PUBLICATIONS  OF  THE 
INSTITUTE  FOR  GOVERNMENT  RESEARCH 


STUDIES  IN  ADMINISTRATION 

The  System  of  Financial  Administration  of  Great  Britain 

By  W.  F.  Willoughby.  W.  W.  Willoughby  and  S.  M.  Lindsay 
The  Budget 

By  Rene  Stourm 

T.  Plazinski,  Translator,  W.  F.  McCaleb.  Editor 
The  Canadian  Budgetary  System 

By  H.  G.  Villard  and  W.  W.  Willoughby  % 

The  Problem  of  a  National  Budget 

By  W.  F.  Willoughby 
The  Movement  for  Budgetary  Reform  in  the  States 

By  W.  F.  Willoughby 
Teachers'  Pension  Systems  in  the  United  States 

By   Paul   Studensky 
Organized  Efforts  for  the  Improvement  of  Methods  of  Ad- 
ministration in  the  United  States 

By  Gustavus  A.  Weber 
The  Federal  Service:   A  Study  of  the  System  of  Personnel 

Administration  of  the  United  States  Government 

By   Lewis    Mayers 
The   System   of   Financial    Administration    of    the   United 

States    (In  preparation) 

PRINCIPLES  OF  ADMINISTRATION 

Principles  Governing  the  Retirement  of  Public  Employees 

By  Lewis  Meriam 
Principles  of  Government  Purchasing 

By  A.  G.  Thomas 
Principles  of  Government  Accounting  and  Reporting 

By  Francis  Oakey,  C.P.A. 
Principles  of  Public  Personnel  Administration 

By  Arthur  W.  Procter 

SERVICE    MONOGRAPHS    OF   THE    UNITED    STATES 
GOVERNMENT 
The  United  States  Geological  Survey 
The  Reclamation  Service 
The  Bureau  of  Mines    (In  preparation) 
The  Public  Health  Service    (In  preparation) 
The  Bureau  of  War  Risk  Insurance    (In  preparation) 

D.  APPLETON  AND  COMPANY 
PUBLISHERS  NEW  YORK 


STUDIES  IN  ADMINISTRATION 


THE    INSTITUTE     FOR    GOVERNMENT    RESEARCH 


THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

A  Study  of  the  System  of  Personnel  Administration 
of  the  United  States  Government 


BY 
LEWIS  MAYERS,  Ph.D.,  LL.B. 

MEMBER  OF  STAFF,  INSTITUTE   FOR 
GOVERNMENT  RESEARCH 


D.  APPLETON  AND  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK  LONDON 

1922 


COPYRIGHT,    1922,   BY 

THE  INSTITUTE  FOR  GOVERNMENT  RESEARCH 


Printed  in  the   United   States  of  America 


,    '•      •      '  *!•'  .*'  !  •'• '«     3,'  ^'c 


THE   INSTITUTE   FOR   GOVERNMENT  RESEARCH 

Washington,  D.  C. 


The  Institute  for  Government  Research  is  an  association  of  citizens 
for  cooperating  with  pubHc  officials  in  the  scientific  study  of  govern- 
ment with  a  view  to  promoting  efficiency  and  economy  in  its  operations 
and  advancing  the  science  of  administration.  It  aims  to  bring  into 
existence  such  information  and  materials  as  will  aid  in  the  formation 
of  public  opinion  and  will  assist  officials,  particularly  those  of  the 
national  government,  in  their  efforts  to  put  the  public  administration 
upon  a  more  efficient  basis. 

To  this  end,  it  seeks  by  the  thoroughgoing  study  and  examination 
of  the  best  administrative  practice,  public  and  private,  American  and 
foreign,  to  formulate  those  principles  which  lie  at  the  basis  of  all 
sound  administration,  and  to  determine  their  proper  adaptation  to  the 
specific  needs  of  our  public  administration. 

The  accomplishment  of  specific  reforms  the  Institute  recognizes  to 
be  the  task  of  those  who  are  charged  with  the  responsibility  of  legis- 
lation and  administration;  but  it  seeks  to  assist,  by  scientific  study  and 
research,  in  laying  a  solid  foundation  of  information  and  experience 
upon  which  such  reforms  may  be  successfully  built. 

While  some  of  the  Institute's  studies  find  application  only  in  the 
form  of  practical  cooperation  with  the  administrative  officers  directly 
concerned,  many  are  of  interest  to  other  administrators  and  of  general 
educational  value.  The  results  of  such  studies  the  Institute  purposes 
to  publish  in  such  form  as  will  insure  for  them  the  widest  possible 
utilization. 


Robert  S.  Brookings, 


Chairman 


Edwin  A.  Alderman 
Robert  S.  Brookings 
James  F.  Curtis 
R.  Fulton  Cutting 
Frederic  A.  Delano 
George  Eastman 
Raymond  B.  Fosdick 
Felix  Frankfurter 


Officers 
Frank  J.  Goodnow, 

Vice-Chairman 

James  F.  Curtis, 

Secretary 

Trustees 
Edwin  F.  Gay 
Frank  J.  Goodnow 
Jerome  D.  Greene 
Arthur  T.  Hadley 
Herbert  C.  Hoover 
A.  Lawrence  Lowell 
Samuel  Mather 
R.  B.  Mellon 

Director 
W.  F.  Willoughby 


Frederick  Strauss, 


Treasurer 


Charles  D.  Norton 
Martin  A.  Ryerson 
Frederick  Strauss 
Silas  H.  Strawn 
William  H.  Taft 
Ray  Lyman  Wilbur 
Robert  S.  Woodward 


PREFACE 

Among  the  fundamental  factors  determining  efficiency  of 
public  administration  that  of  the  system  employed  in  securing, 
compensating,  directing  and  controlling  the  personnel  required 
for  the  conduct  of  governmental  operations  will  always  occupy 
first  rank.  No  amount  of  care  in  determining  how  a  govern- 
ment shall  be  organized  for  the  performance  of  its  work,  the 
manner  in  which  the  funds  necessary  for  its  support  shall  be 
raised  and  expended,  and  the  particular  practices  and  pro- 
cedure that  shall  be  employed  in  carrying  on  its  activities,  will 
give  even  a  measurable  approach  to  efficiency  in  the  actual 
administration  of  public  affiairs  unless  a  technically  competent 
and  loyal  personnel  can  be  secured  and  retained  in  the  service 
and  a  system  devised  whereby  this  personnel  may  be  effiectively 
directed  and  controlled. 

In  view  of  the  importance  of  the  subject  it  is  little  short 
of  remarkable  the  slight  attention  that  this  problem  has  received 
as  a  problem.  There  is  in  existence  a  large  body  of  literature 
dealing  with  what  is  known  as  civil  service  reform.  This 
literature,  however,  scarcely  touches  more  than  one  or  two 
phases  of  the  problem  of  personnel  administration  as  a  whole. 
Primarily  it  is  concerned  with  the  two  related  questions  of 
entrance  into  the  government  service  and  the  legal  status,  from 
the  standpoint  of  tenure  of  office,  of  employees  after  entrance. 
Even  in  respect  of  these  matters  the  interest  of  promoters  of 
reform  has  been  primarily  in  securing  what  may  be  termed 
political,  as  distinguished  from  administrative,  reform.  They 
have  sought  to  purify  our  political  life  by  the  abolition  of  the 
spoils  system  and  the  prevention  of  undue  partisan  activities 
on  the  part  of  public  employees.  Only  in  comparatively  re- 
cent years  have  persons  either  inside  or  outside  of  the  govern- 


Vlll 


PREFACE 


ment  begun  to  concern  themselves  with  other  phases  of  per- 
sonnel administration. 

As  soon  as  studies  of  this  latter  character  began  to  be 
attempted  it  was  at  once  seen  that  the  personnel  problem  was 
an  exceedingly  complicated  and  difficult  one.  It  involved  such 
elements  as  the  determination  of  the  positions  to  be  filled  and 
the  qualifications  required  of  their  incumbents;  the  classifica- 
tion of  these  positions  to  the  end  that  appropriate  rates  of 
compensation  might  be  fixed  and  the  line  of  advancement 
clearly  indicated;  the  fixing  of  the  tenure  of  office;  the  deter- 
mination of  the  method  of  recruitment  of  new  employees 
and  the  machinery  and  methods  to  be  employed  in  securing 
such  employees;  the  adoption  of  systems  for  testing  effi- 
ciency and  of  rules  to  govern  promotions,  transfers,  demo- 
tions and  separations  from  the  service;  and  the  provision  of 
a  retirement  system  that  will  take  care  of  the  financial  needs 
of  those  employees  who  are  dropped  from  the  rolls  on  account 
of  incapacity  resulting  from  old  age  or  disabilities  acquired 
while  in  the  service. 

All  of  these  represent  factors  that  must  be  studied,  and 
studied  with  great  care,  if  a  proper  personnel  system  is  to  be 
secured.  The  present  volume  attempts  such  a  study  of  this 
problem  as  it  confronts  the  national  government.  No  such 
work  has  ever  been  attempted  before.  It  is  at  once  descrip- 
tive, critical  and  constructive.  It  seeks  to  make  known  in 
detail  existing  conditions  regarding  each  phase  of  the  federal 
personnel  system,  to  point  out  wherein  these  conditions  are 
satisfactory  or  the  reverse  and  the  lines  along  which  changes 
should  be  made  to  bring  about  better  conditions.  The  only 
personnel  topic  not  handled  is  that  of  the  provision  made 
for  the  retirement  of  civil  employees.  Important  as  this  sub- 
ject is,  consideration  of  it  was  omitted  partly  on  account  of 
its  special  character  and  partly  due  to  limitations  of  space. 
The  Institute  moreover  has  already  prepared  a  volume  dealing 
with  the  principles  governing  the  retirement  of  public  em- 
ployees, and  it  hopes  before  long  to  publish  one  dealing  spe- 


PREFACE  ix 

cially  with  the  civil  service  retirement  system  of  the  national 
government. 

The  publication  of  this  work  is  especially  timely  due  to 
the  fact  that  the  national  government  now  has  under  way  an 
ambitious  plan  to  reorganize  thoroughly  its  present  personnel 
system  on  the  basis  of  the  recommendations  of  its  Congres- 
sional Joint  Commission  on  Reclassification  of  Salaries  that 
reported  on  March  12,  1920.  Throughout  this  work  these 
recommendations  are  passed  in  review  and  their  merits  com- 
mented upon. 

The  author  of  the  present  volume,  Mr.  Lewis  Mayers,  is 
exceptionally  qualified  for  his  task.  He  took  his  doctor's 
degree  in  political  science  at  Columbia  University  in  1914. 
For  three  years  he  was  with  the  Civil  Service  Commission 
of  New  York  City,  first  as  examiner,  and  later  as  chief  of 
the  Bureau  of  Service  and  Efficiency  Records,  positions  which 
brought  him  into  immediate  contact  with  the  practical  prob- 
lems of  personnel  administration.  While  serving  on  the  staff 
of  the  Institute  for  Government  Research  his  work  was  almost 
wholly  in  this  field  of  public  administration.  Owing  to  the 
fact  that  Mr.  Mayers  left  the  Institute  before  his  volume  was 
put  through  the  press,  certain  changes  have  been  made  in  the 
manuscript  as  submitted  by  him  for  which  he  is  not  responsible. 
This  is  especially  true  of  Chapter  VII. 

W.  F.  WiLLOUGHBY. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.  Introductory i 

Size  of  the  Executive  Civil  Service 2 

Geographical   Distribution  of   Executive  Civil   Service    ....  4 

Character  of  Employments  in  the  Executive  Civil  Service  ...  6 

Women  in  the  Executive  Civil  Service 17 

PART  I.    THE  ELIMINATION  OE  POLITICS  FROM  THE 
EXECUTIVE    CIVIL   SERVICE 

II.  Introductory       19 

Dual  Character  of  the  Federal  Personnel  Problem 19 

Elimination  of  the  Political  Factor  in  Selection  the  First  Essential 

to  an  Efficient  Personnel  System 20 

Means  of  Elimination  of  the  Political  Factor 24 

III.  The  Law  and  Tradition  of   Selection  and  Tenure   ...  26 
The   Civil   Service   Reform   Movement 2(i 

.    Types   of    Systems   of    Formal    Selection 26 

The  System  of  Pass  Examinations 27 

i    The  System  of  'Competitive  Examinations :    Selected  Applicants  28 

^-The  System  of  Competitive  Examinations :  Open  to  All  ....  28 

The   Appointing    Power 29 

Presidential    Positions 32 

Power  of  Congress  to  Control  the  Discretion  of  the  President  in 

Respect  to  Appointments 38 

Non-Presidential  Positions 40 

Early  Legislation  Regarding  Methods  of  Selection 41 

The  Law  of  1871 43 

The  Civil  Service  Act  of  1883 44 

JPhe  Civil  Service  Rules  and  Orders .  54 

JSht    "Classified"    Service 56 

Non-Competitive  Positions 57 

Positions  Excepted  by  the  Rules  and  Orders 60 

Positions   Excepted   by   Statute 64 

Exception  of   Designated   Individuals 68 

Laborers 73 

Strict    Construction    of    Exceptions    from    Formal    Methods    of 

Selection 74 

/Statistics  of  Employees  According  to  Method  of  Selection  Status  80 

j^  Tradition  in  Selection 81 

Term  of    Office 84 

'^''I'rotection  against  Removal  for  Political  Reasons 89 

si 


xii  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

IV.  The  Extension  of  Formal  Systems  of  Selection   ....  96 
Heads  of   Departments   and   Independent   Establishments    ...  96 

Assistant  Secretaries  and  Analogous  Officers 98 

Heads  of  Bureaus  and  Services 99 

Other  Superior  Personnel  at  Washington no 

Solicitors  of  the  Departments no 

Auditors  of  the  Departments iii 

Chief  Examiner  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission in 

Smithsonian    Institution    and    National    Home    for    Disabled 

Volunteer   Soldiers 113 

Subordinate  Personnel  at  Washington 113 

Legal  Employees 114 

Employees  of  Certain  Boards  and  Commissions 116 

Private  Secretaries  and  Confidential   Clerks 117 

Field   Service :   Chief   Officers 120 

General   Conditions 121 

The  Four- Year  Term:  Its  History  and  Disadvantages   .      .     .  123 

Action  Required  to  Put  Field  Services  on  Merit  Basis  .      .      .  124 

Movement  for  Placing  Postal  Service  on  Merit  Basis   .      .      .  126 

Chief  National  Bank  Examiners 132 

Field  Service:  Subordinate  Personnel 133 

Deputy  Collectors  of  Internal  Revenue  and  Deputy  Marshals  .  133 

Field  Employees :  Federal  Farm  Loan  Board 137 

Postal  Employees :   Star  Routes  and  Third  and  Fourth   Class 

Post  Offices 137 

Laborers 138 

Foreign   Service 139 

Conclusion 142 

V.  The  Elimination  of  Political  Interference  Inside  the  Service  144 

The  Congressman  and  Political  Interference 145 

Direct  Prohibition  of  Outside  Intervention  in  Personnel  Matters  148 

Location  of  Legal  Power  in  Personnel  Matters 151 

Politics  and  Salary  Increases 153 

Political   Pressure  upon  Employees  by  Superior  Officers    .     .      .  154 

Prohibition  of  Forced   Campaign   Contributions 155 

Prohibition   of    Forced    Political    Services    ........  158 

Prohibition  of  Coercion  by  Persons  Outside  the  Service   .     .     .  159 

Restrictions  on  Voluntary   Political   Activity 160 


PART  II.  THE  PROBLEM  OF  FEDERAL  PERSONNEL 
ADMINISTRATION 

VI.    Introduction 168 

Special  Factors  in  the  Federal  Personnel   Problem 168 

The  Aim  and  Scope  of   Personnel  Administration 173 


CONTENTS  xiii 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

Procedure  in  Developing  a  Proper  Personnel  System   ....     174 

The  Problem  of  Personnel  Control 176 

The  Need  for  Special  Organization  for  Personnel  Administration     177 

/  VII. /The  Classification  and  Standardization  of  Positions  and 
V/V./        Salaries , 180 

Legislative   Determination   of    Positions   and   Salaries :   The   Stat- 
utory  Roll 181 

Administrative  Determination  of  Positions  and  Salaries :  The  Sum 

Appropriations        185 

Lack  of  Inter-Departmental  Uniformity  in  Titles  and  Compensa- 
tion  Rates 193 

The  Work  of   the   Reclassification   Commission 19S 

Working  Organization  of  the  Commission 196 

Method  of  Determining  Position  Specifications 197 

Scope  and  Character  of   Specifications 200 

Primary  Unit  of  Classification:  The  Class 200 

Arrangement  of  Classes  in  Series  and  Services 202 

Method  of  Determining  Compensation  Rates 203 

Provision  of  Minimum  and  Maximum  Rates 205 

Legal  Determination  of  Specifications  and  Rates 205 

Installation  of   Classification 206 

Current  Administration  and  the  Classification 207 

Classification  and  Appropriation  Technique 20S 

NGeneral   Summary  of   Classification 213 

/VIII.    'Selection  by  Promotion  from  Within  versus  Recruitment 

I  ,/      from   Without 215 

(y-Cdise  for  Selection  by  Promotion  from  Within  the  Service   .     .  216 

"     Existing  Conditions :  Positions  in  the  Natural  Line  of  Promotion  222 

Public  Health   Service 223 

Diplomatic   Service 225 

Consular   Service 226 

Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey 227 

Examining  Force :   Patent  Office 228 

Postal  Service 228 

War  and  Navy  Departments 233 

Civilian  Engineers :   War  Department 234 

Attitude  of  Civil  Service  Commission 236 

Attitude  of   Reclassification   Commission 239 

Central  Control  of  Selection  by  Promotion  from  Within   .      .     .  240 
Existing  Conditions :   Positions  not  in  the  Natural  Line  of  Pro- 
motion        246 

Sub-clerical  Position 249 

Qerical    Position 250 

Stenographic    Positions 250 

Statistical,  Accounting  and  Legal  Positions 251 


xiv  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PACE 

Other  Technical   Positions 252 

Selection  from  Within  as  Affected  by  Educational   Standards  at 

Entrance 252 

The  British  Personnel  System 254 

Applicability  of  British   System  to  American   Conditions    .     .     .  255 

Provision  of  Educational  Facilities 258 

The  Area  of  Selection  from  Within 264 

Attitude  of  Civil   Service   Commission 271 

Attitude   of    Congress 274 

Disadvantages  of  Existing  Restrictions  upon  Transfers  .      .      .  275 

Attitude  of  Reclassification  Commission 284 

Absence  of  Means  for  Locating  Eligibles  for  Transfer  .      .      .  286 
Advantages  of  Recruiting  Personnel  at  Washington  from  the 

Field  Services 287 

Technical  Obstacles  to  Selection  from  Within 292 


IX.  Methods  of  Selection  from  Within  :  Reassignment  and  Pro- 

motion       298 

Promotion    and    Reassignment    Distinguished    from    Increase    of 

Compensation 298 

Reassignment  versus   Promotion 299 

Reassignment  Involving  No  Change  of  Compensation  or  Grade  .  300 

Reassignment  Involving  Increase  of  Compensation 303 

The  Case  for  Formal  Promotion  Methods 303 

Existing  Promotion  Methods 307 

Central   Restrictions 307 

Departmental    Restrictions 310 

Political  and  Other  Improper  Influences  in  Selection  for  Promotion  312 

The  Technical  Problem  of  Formal  Promotion  Methods  ....  317 

Types  of  Formal  Methods  of   Promotion 318 

Seniority 318 

Efficiency  Record 321 

Competitive   Examination 332 

Combination  of   Efficiency  Records,  Competitive  Examinations 

and    Seniority 227 

"X.  General   Summary  of   Formal   Promotion  Methods 338 

X.  Recruit  Methods:  Some  Basic  Aspects 345 

Emphasis  upon   Education 345 

Requirement  of  Specialized  Knowledge  and  Experience  ....  347 

Training   for    Entrance 351 

Maximum  Age  Limits 353 

Recruitment  of  Women 355 

Basic  Questions  of  Practical  Procedure 357 

Fully-Assembled,  Local-Assembled  and  Non-Assembled  Examina- 
tions      358 

Oral,  Written  and  Manual  Tests 361 


CONTENTS  XV 

CHAPTER  PAGB 

Experience  Tests 364 

^     Education  Tests 367 

Technical  Capacity  Tests 369 

Psychological  Tests 372 

;     Personality  Tests Zl^ 

XI.  Recruitment  Methods:  The   Classified  Competitive  Service  37S 

Legal  Basis 379 

Area  of  Competition 380 

Examining  and  Recruiting  Organization 385 

Places  of  Holding  Examinations 386 

Ordering  of  Examinations 387 

Advertising  and   Inviting  Applications 389 

Safeguarding  the  Integrity  of  Examinations 392 

Examination  of  Fourtli  Class  Postmasters  and  Rural  Carriers   .     .  398 

Speed   of   Production  of    Eligible   Registers 404 

Appeals    for   Re-rating 406 

Military   Preference 406 

Certification  for  Apportioned  Positions 413 

Restriction  of  Certification  of  Members  of  Same  Family  .     .     .  428 

The  "Three  Name"   Certification  Rule 429 

Discretion  in  Fixing  Entrance  Compensation  Rates 440 

Publicity  of  Eligible  Registers 441 

Probationary  Period 444 

^     Efficiency  of  the  Competitive  Examination  System 446 

XII.  ]  Recruitment  Methods  :  The  Unclassified  Service  ....  454 

V^^residential    Postmasters 454 

Laborers 465 

Consular  Service 471 

Diplomatic    Service 476 

Public  Health  Service  Medical  Officers 478 

XIII.  The  Maintenance  of  Individual  Efficiency 480 

Records  as  a  Means  of  Promoting  Individual  Efficiency   .     .     .  481 

Piece  Work  as  a  Means  of  Promoting  Individual  Efficiency  .     .  4S2 
Periodic  Salary  Increases  as  a  Means  of   Promoting  Individual 

Efficiency 482 

Recommendation  of  the  Reclassification  Commission  Regarding 

Salary  Increases 490 

Liability  to  Demotion  and  Dismissal  as  a  Means  of   Promoting 

Individual  Efficiency 492 

Existing  Law  and   Regulations   Regarding  Dismissals    ....  495 
Possible   Machinery  for  Controlling  Exercise  of  Power  of  Dis- 
missal         501 

Power  to  Suspend  as  a  Means  of  Promoting  Individual  Efficiency  507 

Other  Factors  for  Promoting  Individual  Efficiency 508 


xvi  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

General  Attractiveness  of  the  Public  Service 508 

Security 510 

The   Merit   System SIO 

Opportunity  for  Advancement 511 

XIV.  Working  Conditions 5 18 

Hours   of   Labor 518 

Overtime  Work 5I9 

Leave    Privileges 521 

Physical  Environment,  Medical  Services,  etc 525 

XV.  Organization  for  Personnel  Administration 529 

Analysis  of  the  Problem 529 

Organization  for  Recruitment 53o 

The  Problem  of  the  Examining  Personnel 531 

Organization    for   Internal  Administration 536 

Organization  for  Classification  of  Positions  and  Salaries   .      .     .  536 

Organization  for  Determination  of  Physical  Work  Conditions  .     .  537 

Organization  for  Elimination  of  Political  Considerations    .     .     .  537 

Dual  Character  of  the  Problem  of   Central  Administration   .     .  538 

Departmental  Organization 543 

XVI.  Employees  Organizations  and  Committees 544 

Employees  Organizations 544 

Existing    Employees    Organizations 545 

Legislative  Activities   of   Employees   Organizations 546 

Right  of   Employees  Organization  to  Affiliate  with   Outside  Or- 
ganizations      556 

Right  of  Employees  Organizations  to  Strike 558 

General  Conclusions  Regarding  Place  of  Employees  Organizations 

in  a  Government  Personnel  System 559 

Employees    Committees 561 

Existing  Machinery  for  Employees  Representation 562 

Attitude  of  Reclassification  Commission  in  Respect  to  Employees 

Representation 564 

Machinery  for  Conference  in  the   British   Service 566 

Composition  of  Employees  Committees 569 

The  Function  of    Employees   Committees 570 

Employees  Organizations  as  Representatives  of  Employees  before 

Management 571 

Appendix 575 

Index 595 


THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 


THE   FEDERAL  SERVICE 


CHAPTER  I 

INTRODUCTORY 

/-  The  present  volume  concerns  itself  almost  exclusively  with 
the  personnel  of  the  civil  service  of  the  executive  branch  of 
tlie  government.  The  employees  of  Congress  ^  and  of  the 
judicial  branch  -  of  the  government  are  not  at  any  point  con- 
sidered in  the  body  of  the  discussion,  but  they  receive  inci- 
dental mention.  Similarly,  the  personnel  of  the  municipal 
government  of  the  District  of  Columbia  is  excluded  from  con- 
sideration as  not  being  properly  a  part  of  the  federal  service. 
Although  the  executive  civil  service  is  clearly  distinguished, 
for  the  most  part,  from  the  military  and  naval  services,  two 
branches  of  the  former  may  be  regarded  as  quasi-military  and 
naval.  The  organization  of  the  medical  officers  of  the  Public 
Healtii  Service  is  in  many  points  similar  to  that  of  the  military 
and  naval  services  and  in  time  of  war  these  officers  may  be 
detailed,  at  the  direction  of  the  President,  to  the  army  or  the 
navy.  When  so  detailed  they  do  not  lose  their  civilian  status 
unless  they  choose  to  accept  temporary  commissions  in  the 
military  or  naval   forces.     Their  commissions  in  the  Public 

^The  Library  of  Congress  is  not  discussed,  because  it  is  under  the  con- 
trol of  the  legislative  branch,  although  the  Librarian  and  the  Superin- 
tendent of  the  building  are  appointed  by  the  President  by  and  with  the 
advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate. 

^  It  is  understood,  of  course,  that  aside  from  the  judges  and  commis- 
sioners only  the  clerical  employees  of  the  courts  are  regarded  as  falling 
in  the  judicial  branch.  The  marshals  and  their  deptities,'  and  the 
custodial  employees  attached  to  the  buildings  where  the  courts  'sit,  are 
employees  in  the  executive  service,  being  under  the  direction  of  the 
Department  of  Justice  and  of  the  Treasury  Department,  respectively. 

I 


2  .  .THE.  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Health  Service,  moreover,  do  not  obligate  them  to  serve  for 
any  given  term  of  years.  The  Public  Health  Service  con- 
sequently has  been  regarded  in  this  volume  as  essentially  a 
civilian  ser\'ice. 

The  Coast  Guard,  on  the  other  hand,  although  not  strictly 
a  part  of  the  naval  service,  has  been,  especially  recently,  so 
largely  assimilated  in  that  service  with  respect  to  the  per- 
sonnel that  it  has  been  treated  as  outside  the  range  of  the 
present  discussion.  Not  only  may  the  service  as  a  whole  in 
time  of  w'ar  l^e  made  an  integral  part  of  the  naval  service  (as 
it  was  during  the  late  war)  but  even  when  on  a  peace  footing 
enlistment  in  the  Coast  Guard  service  is  for  a  definite  term 
of  years. 

As  used  in  the  following  pages,  then,  the  term  executive 
civil  service  embraces  all  officers  and  employees  of  the  federal 
government  except  those  of  the  legislative  and  judicial 
branches,  the  army,  the  navy,  the  Coast  Guard,  and  the  Dis- 
trict of  Columbia. 

A  term  frequently  encountered  in  dealing  with  federal 
governmental  matters  is  "departmental  service."  This  refers 
to  all  the  personnel  attached  to  the  central  offices  of  the  several 
departments,  bureaus,  and  services  at  Washington,  and  is  used 
in  contradistinction  to  "field  service,"  which  embraces  all 
personnel  of  all  services  outside  of  Washington,^  with  the  ex- 
ception of  those  in  the  consular  and  diplomatic  services,  which 
are  collectively  designated  as  the  "foreign  service." 
Size  of  the  Executive  Civil  Service. — The  most  recent 
reliable  figures  available  regarding  the  extent  and  distribution 
of  the  federal  executive  civil  service  are  those  published  by 
the  Bureau  of  the  Census  in  the  Official  Register  of  the  United 
States  for  19 19.  These  figures  show  the  number  and  distribu- 
tion of  the  executive  civil  service  on  July  ist,  191 9,  to  have 
been  approximately  as  follows  : 

*  The  personnel  of  establishments  which,  while  they  happen  to  be 
located  in  Washington,  are  not  attached  to  the  central  aihiiinistration,  is 
regarded,  of  course,  as  falling  in  the  field  service.  The  Washington 
navy  yard  and  the  Washington  post  office  are  the  two  chief  establish- 
ments in  this  class. 


INTRODUCTORY  3 

Approximate  Number  of  Employees  in  the  Executive  and  Admin- 
istrative Services  of  the  Federal  Government,  July  i,  1919.^     * 

The  White  House 47 

Department  of  State   2,019 

Treasury  Department   61,640 

Department  of  Justice  5.722 

War  Department  (August  i,  1919)   195.256 

Navy  Department   107,788 

Post  Office  Department  286,840 

Department  of  the  Interior 18,660 

Department  of  Agriculture 22,972 

Department  of  Commerce 10,632 

Department  of  Labor 3.675 

Interstate  Commerce  Commission 2,214 

Civil  Service  Commission  306 

Federal  Reserve  Board  167 

Federal  Trade  Commission 335 

United  States  Shipping  Board   (including  Emergency  Fleet 

Corporation)    11,071 

The  Panama  Canal    17.594 

Government  Printing  Office  4.773 

Smithsonian  Institution   433 

Alien  Property  Custodian 328 

Other  Independent  Establishments,  Boards,  Commissions,  etc.  4.623 

Total  (approximate)    757.095 

On  July  I,  191 9  the  total  number  of  civil  employees  in  the 
executive  and  administrative  services  of  the  federal  govern- 
ment amounted  to  something  over  750,000.  In  considering 
this  figure  it  is  to  be  taken  into  account,  of  course,  that  the 
personnel  of  many  of  the  services  was  somewhat  swollen  as 
the  result  of  conditions  growing  out  of  the  war.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  has  been  demonstrated  that  the  greater  number  of  the 
services  tjius  affected  will  continue  to  require  a  personnel  far 
in  excess  of  that  which  they  had  prior  to  the  war,  while  some, 
for  example,  the  Bureau  of  Internal  Revenue,  will  probably 
undergo  enlargement.  The  total  given  thus  may  be  taken  as 
representing  in  an  approximate  manner  the  size  of  the  civil 
personnel  of  the  executive  and  administrative  branches  of  the 
federal  government. 

*  The  details  are  given  in  the  Appendix,  Table  I. 


4  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Geographical  Distribution  of  Executive  Civil  Service. — 
A  factor  of  no  little  importance  in  considering  the  size  of  the 
executive  civil  service  is  that  of  the  distribution  of  this  force 
between  the  departmental  personnel  at  Washington  and  the 
field  services  whose  duties  are  performed  at  points  outside  of 
the  seat  of  government.  The  tendency  is  very  pronounced  to 
look  upon  Washington  as  the  seat  of  the  government's  activi- 
ties and  to  over-emphasize  the  problems  of  personnel  having 
to  do  with  the  departmental  services.  In  fact,  much  of  the 
work  carried  on  in  Washington  is  but  the  supervision  and  the 
official  recording  of  the  real  work  which  is  done  at  various 
points  throughout  the  country.  Such  central  control  and 
record  work  requires,  of  course,  clerical  labor  in  far  greater 
proportion  than  does  the  actual  technical  or  industrial  work 
controlled  and  recorded.  Washington  is,  moreover,  the  seat 
of  those  relatively  few  yet  large  services  where  work  is  almost 
exclusively  clerical — the  Veterans'  Bureau,  the  Pension  Office, 
the  Census  Office,  and  the  like.  Even  with  all  these  factors 
present,  however,  the  purely  clerical  population  of  the  govern- 
ment establishments  in  Washington  is  much  less  than  is  com- 
monly supposed. 

The  distribution  of  the  federal  personnel  between  Wash- 
ington and  the  field  on  June  30,  191 9,  as  derived^  from  the 
tabulation  of  the  Census  Bureau  ^  is  giyen  opposite. 

No  general  figures  are  available  of  the  distribution  of  the 
federal  personnel  among  the  several  cities  and  states,  but 
figures  compiled  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  in  191 3, 
show  that  there  were  in  the  classified  service  in  New  York 
City  in  that  year  20,007  persons,  including  11,031  in  the  Post 
Office  Service,  3,869  in  the  Navy  Yard,  2,607  in  the  Customs 
Service,  436  in  the  Immigration  Service,  351  in  the  Railway 
Mail  Service,  and  261  in  the  Lighthouse  Service.- 

In  addition  to  the  20,000  or  more  "classified"  employees 
there  shown  there  were  laborers,  numbering,  doubtless,  several 
thousands. 

^Official  Register  of  the  United  Slates,  1919,  pp.  lO  to  12. 
^  The  details  are  given  in  the  Appendix,  Table  II. 


INTRODUCTORY 


Approximate  Number  of  Civil  Employees  in  the  Executive  and 
Administrative  Services  of  the  Federal  Government,  July 
I,  1919,  Classified  by  Location 


Services 


The  White  House  

Department  of  State  

Treasury  Department   

Department  of  Justice   

War  Department  (Civilian 
employees)   

Navy  Department  (Civilian 
employees)     

Post  Office  Department   

Department  of  the  Interior  . . 

Department  of  Agriculture   . . 

Department  of  Commerce  .... 

Department  of  Labor   

Interstate  Commerce  Commis- 
sion     

Civil  Service  Commission   . . . 

Federal  Reserve  Board   

Federal   Trade   Commission    . 

United  States  Shipping  Board, 
Emergency  Fleet  Corpora- 
tion     

The  Panama  Canal  

Government  Printing  Office  . . 

Smithsonian  Institution 

Alien  Property  Custodian   . . . 

Bureau  of  Efficiency 

United  States  Tariff  Commis- 
sion     

Employees'  Compensation  Com- 
mission     

Federal  Board  for  Vocational 
Education  

State,  War,  and  Navy  Build- 
ings     

Council  of   National   Defense 

Boards,  Commissions,  etc.  . . . 
Grand  Total 


Employed  in 

Employed  Out- 

District of 

side  of  District 

Total 

Columbia 

of  Columbia 

47 

— 

47 

1,132 

887 

2,019 

28,366 

33,274 

61,640 

734 

4,988 

5.722 

17,660 

177,596 

195,256 

10,505 

97-283 

107,788 

1,784 

285,056 

286,840 

5,562 

13,098 

18,660 

5,056 

17,916 

22,972 

2,198 

8,434 

10,632 

766 

2,909 

3,675 

806 

1,408 

2,214 

260 

46 

306 

143 

24 

167 

335 

■"^ 

335 

2,035 

9,036 

11,071 

138 

17,456 

17,594 

4,773 

— 

4,773 

433 

— 

433 

294 

34 

328 

24 

— 

24 

54 

— 

54 

49 

— 

49 

387 

2,054 

2,441 

1,806 

— 

1,806 

91 

— 

91 

158 

— 

158 

'  85,596 

671,499 

'  757,095 

*  This  total  does   not  include  the   following:     2164  officers   and   em- 
ployees of  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives;  the  1363  officers  and 


6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

On  July  I,  1 9 19,  the  total  number  of  civil  employees  located 
in  Washington  was  slightly  in  excess  of  85,000.  If  to  this  is 
added  the  number  of  civil  employees  attached  to  Congress  and 
other  employees  indicated  by  the  footnote,  the  total  amounted 
to  approximately  100,000.  It  is  probable  that  this  number  has 
undergone  some  diminution  as  the  services  have  more  and 
more  adjusted  themselves  to  peace  conditions.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  constantly  increasing  scope  of  the  activities  of  the 
national  government  brings  with  it  a  corresponding  increase 
in  personnel.  It  is  thus  not  far  out  of  the  way  to  view  the 
problem  of  the  departmental  personnel  at  Washington  as  one 
having  to  do  with  a  total  of  from  80,000  to  100,000  employees. 
Character  of  Employments  in  the  Executive  Service. — 
An  appreciation  of  the  diversity  of  occupations  in  the  federal 
civil  service  is  indispensable  for  a  real  understanding  of  the 
federal  personnel  problem.  When  that  diversity  is  grasped, 
the  impracticability  becomes  apparent  of  attempting  to  apply 
to  the  whole  of  the  federal  service  a  single  uniform  and  un- 
varying rule  or  practice  with  respect  to  any  one  of  the  major 
elements  of  personnel  administration. 

There  exists  no  single  comprehensive  classification  of  all 
federal  employments  so  presented  as  to  give  merely  by  the 
titles  a  complete  picture  of  the  service.  The  recent  report  of 
the  Reclassification  Commission  has  presented,  however,  and 
for  the  first  time,  a  comprehensive  classification  of  positions 
found  in  the  federal  departments  at  Washington.  The  clas- 
sification proposed  by  the  Commission  groups  all  the  positions 
at  Washington  into  376  distinct  categories,  each  of  which  is 
known  as  a  series.     Each  series  embraces  positions  involving 

employees  of  the  Railroad  Administration,  on  duty  in  Washington ;  the 
2400  yeomen  (F)  ;  an  average  of  1900  temporary  laborers  on  outside 
work  for  the  District  of  Columbia;  the  5627  regular  employees  of  the 
District  of  Columbia;  nor  the  s6S  employees  of  the  Library  of  Congress. 
Adding  these  omitted  classes  to  the  totals  given  above,  the  result  would 
equal  the  corresponding  totals  given  on  page  10  of  the  Official  Register  for 
1919,  as  follows : 

Employed  in  the  District 99,618 

Employed  outside  of  the  District 671,499 

Total  771,117 


INTRODUCTORY  7 

substantially  the  same  kind  of  work.  The  series  are  subdi- 
vided into  what  the  Commission  terms  classes  on  the  basis  of 
the  difficulty  of  the  exact  duties  performed  and  the  degree  of 
responsibility  involved.  The  total  number  of  these  classes  is 
1,762. 

Undoubtedly  were  a  similar  form  of  classification  to  be 
extended  to  the  field  services,  the  total  number  of  series  and 
of  grades  would  be  greatly  enlarged. . 

Passing  to  the  matter  of  the  numerical  distribution  of  the 
personnel  among  these  numerous  classes  of  employment,  the 
multiplicity  of  specialized  employments  makes  any  brief,  sum- 
mary classification  difficult  and  largely  arbitrary.  For  the  pur- 
pose in  hand,  however,  they  may  be  regarded  as  falling  roughly 
into  six  broad  groups:  (i)  directing,  (2)  technical  or  pro- 
fessional, (3)  specialized,  (4)  clerical,  (5)  mechanical,  and 
(6)  labor. 

The  broad  distinctions  indicated  by  these  terms  are  suf- 
ficiently clear,  except  as  to  that  between  the  technical,  or  pro- 
fessional, and  the  specialized  personnel.  The  distinction  here 
intended  to  be  drawn  is  of  basic  importance  in  any  considera- 
tion of  the  federal  personnel  problem.  Under  the  term  pro- 
fessional, or  technical,  personnel  are  included  all  those  various 
employments  which  require  qualifications  and  give  experience 
substantially  similar  to  what  is  involved  in  the  business,  pro- 
fessional, or  academic  world.  Such,  for  example,  are  the 
positions  of  physician  in  the  Public  Health  Service,  attorney 
in  the  department  of  Justice,  or  of  engineer  in  the  War  De- 
partment. By  specialized  personnel  are  meant  those  positions 
which,  while  frequently  requiring  a  high  degree  of  skill  and 
experience,  are  peculiar  to  the  government  service  and  are  not 
found  in  the  outside  world.  The  posts  of  Superintendent  of 
Mails,  of  Indian  Superintendent,  and  of  Consul,  are  examples 
of  this  group. 

The  classes  which  have  been  indicated,  of  course,  are  not 
sharply  marked  off  from  one  another.  The  higher  clerical 
positions  merge  in  many  instances  into  what  has  been  desig- 
nated the  specialized  class,  and,  in  some  cases,  into  the  direct- 


8  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

ing  class ;  and  the  line  between  the  professional  and  the  spe- 
cialized classes,  which  has  just  been  drawn,  is  not  clear  at  all 
points.  Nevertheless,  for  purposes  of  discussion,  the  dis- 
tinctions drawn  are  real  and  useful. 

Since  the  classification  suggested  is  wholly  unofficial,  no 
figures,  or  even  primary  data,  exist  from  which  the  numbers 
embraced  in  the  several  classes  can  be  accurately  determined. 
Such  figures  would  be  of  great  value  in  furnishing  the  true 
perspective  in  which  all  proposals  bearing  on  personnel  ad- 
ministration should  be  viewed.  There  are  available,  however, 
figures  compiled  in  1907  by  the  Census  Bureau  as  the  result  of 
a  special  census  of  government  employees.^ 

The  figures  recognize  each  of  the  classes  above  mentioned 
except  the  specialized  class,  the  members  of  which  were  re- 
garded as  falling  under  one  or  another  of  the  other  classes,  pre- 
sumably chiefly  under  the  clerical  and  the  technical ;  postal  arid 
railway  mail  clerks  being  classified,  for  example,  as  clerical. 
The  figures  given  below  are  as  of  July  i,  1907,  and  are  based 
on  the  titles  of  the  positions  held  by  the  incumbents  and  not 
on  a  statement  of  their  duties.  The  report  of  the  Reclassi- 
fication Commission  emphasizes  the  fact  previously  proven 
that  the  titles  are  not  descriptive.  The  title  "clerk,"  for  ex- 
ample, embraces  many  who  are  in  reality  stenographers,  com- 
puters, and  calculators,  or  followers  of  some  other  specialized 
occupation.  The  figures,  therefore,  should  be  regarded  only 
as  giving  a  general  picture  of  the  service,  not  precise  details. 

Executive  Civil  Service  Employees,  1907,  Classified  by 
Occupations^ 
Executive : 

Chiefs  of  divisions,  chief  clerks,  and  officers  in  charge  . .  985 

Heads  of  Departments,  independent  offices,  and  bureaus  . .  165 

Heads  of  local  offices  331 

Melters,  Mint  and  Assay  Service 355 

Superintendents,     miscellaneous,     not    including     superin- 
tendents of  construction  187 

Superintendents  of  Indian  schools    134 

Total :  Executive    2,157 

*  "Statistics  of  Employees.  Executive  Civil  Service  of  the  United 
States,''  by  Lewis  Meriam,  1907,  Bureau  of  the  Census,  Bulletin  94. 

*  Taken  from  Table  74,  p.  117,  of  "Statistics  of  Employees." 


INTRODUCTORY  9 

Executive  Civil  Service  Employees,  1907,  Classified  by 
Occupations — Continued 

Professional,  technical,  and  scientific : 

Architects     7 

Attorneys     89 

Botanists    106 

Chaplains    3 

Chemists  and  physicists   182 

Curators   29 

Draftsmen,  artists,  illustrators,  etc 1,068 

Electricians  and  dynamo  tenders 215 

Engineers,  civil,  mechanical,  and  electrical  993 

Engravers    123 

Fish  culturists  42 

Geographers,  geologists,  and  paleontologists 129 

Inspectors,  live  stock,  meat,  and  dairy  products,  and  vet- 
erinarians    i>987 

Inspectors,  steam  vessels  174 

Internes    4 

Masters,  mates,  pilots,  and  captains 702 

Members  of  Board  of  Pension  Appeals 28 

Musicians  40 

Nurses    142 

Observers,  Weather  Bureau  391 

Patent  examiners   303 

Pharmacists   55 

Physicians  and  surgeons   449 

Scientific  experts  and  investigators  715 

Special  agents,  experts,  appraisers,  and  commissioners    . .  1,403 

Statisticians    82 

Surveyors   and  levelers    143 

Technical  employees,  Mint  and  Assay  Service   yy 

Zoologists     64 

Total :  Professional,  technical,  and  scientific 9^745 

Clerical : 

Bookkeepers,  accountants,  pay  clerks,  etc 755 

Carriers,  mail   62,084 

Cashiers  and  tellers 302 

Clerks    38,168 

Computers  and  calculators  57 

Editors  and  compilers  56 

Interpreters    167 

Law^  clerks 212 

Librarians    84 

Office  deputy  United  States  marshals   917 


lo  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Executive  Civil  Service  Employees,  1907,  Classified  by 
Occupations — Continued 

Postmasters,  assistant   1,202 

Private  secretaries  iii 

Railway  postal  clerks   13,924 

Stenographers  and  typists   1,512 

Storekeepers    335 

Superintendents  or  clerks  in  charge  of  stations   2,001 

Teachers     655 

Telegraph  and  telephone  operators  74 

Translators    20 

Total :  Clerical    122,636 

Mechanical : 

Building  tradesmen   394 

Engineers,   steam    i  -4 1 3 

General   mechanics    397 

Leather  workers    153 

Lithographers     15 

Metal   workers    2,580 

Photographers     43 

Plate  printers    708 

Printing  tradesmen    1,801 

Woodworkers    1,092 

Total :  Mechanical   8,596 

Sub-clerical  and  manual  labor: 

Apprentices    183 

Assistant  microscopists   — 

Cooks  and  bakers    548 

Custodians  and  miscellaneous  keepers   362 

Domestics  and  waiters   319 

Farmers    469 

Firemen    1,146 

Foremen   1 ,000 

Gangers    2,301 

Guards    i  ,974 

Hospital  attendants   847 

Industrial  teachers  83 

Janitors,  cleaners,  scrubbers,  charwomen,  etc 2,081 

Keepers,  Light-House  Service   1,566 

Laborers,  unskilled    9,564 

Matrons    486 

Messengers    2,036 

Openers  and  packers  593 


INTRODUCTORY  li 

Executive  Civil  Service  Employees,  1907,  Classified  by 
Occupations — Continued 

Samplers    / 133 

Skilled  laborers  and  workmen   6,968 

Stewards   and  quartermasters    189 

Stock  examiners   and  taggers    556 

Surfmen,  Life-Saving  Service  1.675 

Surveymen     171 

Watchmen,  detectives,  doorkeepers,  gatemen,  and  elevator 

conductors    i>847 

Total :  Sub-clerical  and  manual  labor  37.097 

Miscellaneous : 

Commissioned  officers   139 

Deputy  collectors 2,080 

Inspectors,    Customs    Service    1,528 

Inspectors,  immigrant,  Chinese,  sanitary,  and  school   ....  482 

Inspectors,  post  office   ; 398 

Inspectors,   work   and  materials    797 

Student  assistants  and  collaborators loi 

Officers  of  tribal  courts   118 

Total :    Miscellaneous    5,643 

Grand  Total    185,874 


While  this  table  is  valuable  as  reflecting  the  diversity. of 
the  occupations  in  the  service  and  indicating  roughly  their 
numerical  distribution,  a  summary  compiled  from  the  fore- 
going would  be  misleading,  owing  to  the  omission  from  the 
table^  for  special  reasons  not  here  relevant,  of  62,663  post- 
masters, 18,376  mechanics  and  laborers  at  Navy  Yards  and 
Naval  Stations,  and  12,850  clerks  in  post  offices  not  having 
free  delivery ;  and  because  in  the  table  the  great  body  of  letter 
carriers,  railway  mail  clerks,  and  posCal  clerks  are  grouped 
under  the  clerical  class,  a  grouping  which,  however  correct 
technically,  fails  to  bring  out  the  clear  line  between  these  spe- 
cialized employees  and  the  ordinary  clerical  employees  of  the 
government.  In  the  following  summary  table  the  omissions 
mentioned  have  been  remedied  and  the  figures  for  the  postal 
service  set  out  separately.     The  War  and  Navy  Departments, 


12 


THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 


owing  to  the  large  mechanical  and  labor  forces  employed  in 
arsenals,  navy  yards,  and  the  like  also  present  special  points 
of  interest  which  makes  it  desirable  that  they  be  set  out  sepa- 
rately. 

Executive  Civil  Service  Employees,    1907,   Classified  by   Main 
Groups  of  Occupations 


Groups 


Total    

Executive   

Professional, 
Technical,  and 
Scientific    .. . . 

Clerical    

Mechanical 

Sub-clerical   and 
Labor    

Miscellaneous    . 


All 

Total 

Services 

^79,7^1 

97,439 

2,157 

2,020 

Q-745 

9,714 

198,149 

17,775 

26,972 

26,888 

37,097 

35,793 

5,643 

5,249 

Other  than 
Post  Office  Department 


57,487 
1,741 


7,825 

13,499 
4,112 

25,821 
4,489 


13    U    M 


39,952 
279 


4,276 
22,776 

9,972 
760 


o  s 

o   ex 


182,324 
137 


31 
180,374  ^ 
84 

1,304 
394 


*  All  postmasters,  (>2,(:^2,  in  number,  have  been  included  in  this  item, 
although  some  hundreds  of  them  in  cliarge  of  the  larger  offices  would  more 
properly  be  classed  as  executive;  12,850  clerks  in  offices  not  having  free 
delivery,  excluded  from  the  previous  table,  arc  also  included  in  this  item. 

'  18,376  mechanics  and  laborers  in  Navy  Yards  not  included  in  the 
preceding  table  are  included  in  this  item,  it  being  impossible  to  distinguish 
between  those  properly  classed  as  mechanics  and  those  properly  classed  as 
laborers. 


Examination  of  these  figures  discloses  that,  in  1907,  if  the 
Postal  Service,  which,  of  course,  is  in  a  class  by  itself,  be  ex- 
cluded, the  clerical  employees  of  the  government  numbered 
less  than  20  per  cent  of  the  whole.  They  were  outnumbered 
by  the  mechanical  employees,  who  comprised  some  28  per 
cent,  and  they  were  less  than  half  as  numerous  as  the  sub- 
clerical  and  labor  employees  (subclerical  includes  messengers, 
watchmen,  etc.)  and  they  were  less  than  twice  as  numerous 


INTRODUCTORY  13 

as  the  professional,  technical,  and  scientific  group.  These  cal- 
culations embrace,  however,  the  War  and  Navy  Departments 
with  their  arsenals  and  navy  yards  employing  the  greater  pro- 
portion of  the  mechanical  employees  above  referred  to  as  com- 
prising 28  per  cent  of  the  whole.  Even  if  these  two  depart- 
ments be  excluded  from  consideration,  however,  the  clerical 
employees  will  be  found  in  the  1907  figures  to  total  consid- 
erably under  25  per  cent  of  the  whole,  the  professional  em- 
ployees about  13  per  cent,  mechanical  employees  about  7  per 
cent,  and  the  subclerical  and  labor  employees  over  45  per  cent. 

While  the  federal  service,  of  course,  has  expanded  enor- 
mously since  1907,  it  is  probable  that  the  relative  distribution 
of  the  personnel  to-day  would  not  be  widely  different  from 
that  disclosed  by  these  figures.  What  changes  have  taken 
place  doubtless  have  been  in  the  direction  of  increasing  the 
relative  importance  of  the  technical  and  mechanical  employees. 
Even  before  the  war,  the  tendency  was  increasingly  toward 
an  enlargement  of  the  government's  own  arsenals  and  naval 
ordnance  factories ;  while  the  scientific  research,  bureaus  ex- 
perienced a  very  rapid  development  in  the  decade  preceding 
the  war. 

It  is  thus  even  truer  perhaps  to-day  than  the  tables  pre- 
sented show  it.  to  have  been  in  1907,  that  the  "government 
clerk"  is  by  no  means  so  dominant  a  factor  in  the  federal  per- 
sonnel problem  as  he  is  conceived  in  the  popular  imagination. 

The  conception  of  the  national  governmental  machine  as 
a  vast  circumlocution  office  occupied  solely  by  clerks  engaged 
in  the  preparation,  copying,  filing,  and  indexing  of  official 
papers  may  have  had  some  validity  a  few  score  years  ago ;  but 
it  is  now  utterly  erroneous.  In  only  a  few  of  the  services  is 
the  burden  of  the  real  work  carried  on  by  clerks.  In  almost 
every  case  the  work  requires  and  is  performed  by  technical 
men.  The  exaggerated  number  of  clerical  workers  in  the  con- 
ventional personnel  picture  is  doubtless  due  in  part  to  the  fact 
that  when  the  average  citizen  comes  into  contact  with  the  op- 
erations by  the  government  at  all,  it  is  generally  with  a  clerk 
that  he  has  to  do  business.     The  innumerable  and  extensive 


14  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

technical,  industrial,  inspectional,  and  protective  services  of  the 
government  are  carried  on  silently  and  without  the  knowledge 
of  the  man  in  the  street. 

Regarding  government  employees  in  the  District  of  Co- 
lumbia, more  recent  statistics  have  been  supplied  by  the  Con- 
gressional Joint  Commission  on  Reclassification  of  Salaries. 
The  Commission's  figures  relate  to  April  30,  1919,  and  in- 
clude all  employees  within  their  jurisdiction  who  work  full 
time  and  who  receive,  in  addition  to  their  salaries,  no  allow- 
ance for  board  and  lodging.  All  public  employees  in  the 
District  of  Columbia  are  included  except  those  in  the  Postal 
Service  and  in  the  Navy  Yard.  The  figures,  therefore,  in- 
clude the  teachers,  the  police,  the  firemen,  and  other  municipal 
and  court  employees  who  are  beyond  the  scope  of  the  present 
volume. 

In  using  these  statistics,  it  should  be  borne  in  mind  that 
the  grouping  of  classes  into  services  used  by  the  Commission  is 
not  based  on  general  statistical  considerations.  This  group- 
ing has  attempted  to  place  in  the  same  service,  or  in  the  same 
series  within  a  service,  the  classes  of  positions  which  may  lie 
within  the  same  line  of  normal  advancement.  Since  one  of 
its  aims  was  to  work  in  the  direction  of  making  possible  suc- 
cessful careers  in  the  government  service,  it  has  at  times  put 
into  the  same  service  positions  requiring  very  general,  ele- 
mentary qualifications  and  those  requiring  high  technical,  or 
scientific,  attainments  in  the  same  line,  and  almost  uniformly 
it  has  placed  administrators  in  the  same  service  with  the  em- 
ployees they  administer.  Only  when  the  work  supervised  falls 
in  two  or  more  different  services  are  the  administrators  com- 
monly placed  in  a  distinct  service.  The  statistics  of  this 
grouping  were  compiled  for  individual  classes  set  up  to 
aid  the  Commission  in  arriving  at  its  recommendations  re- 
garding salaries  and  not  to  give  a  statistical  picture  of  the  gov- 
ernment service  at  Washington,  They  may  be  used,  however, 
for  this  latter  purpose,  and  a  summary  of  them  is  presented 
in  the  tabular  statement  that  follows. 

These  statistics,  it  should  be  noted,  are  based,  not  on  the 


INTRODUCTORY  15 

official  payroll  title  of  the  employee,  nor  upon  the  common 
or  office  title,  but  on  a  statement  of  the  duties  actually  per- 
formed by  the  employee,  as  given  both  by  the  employee  him- 
self and  his  immediate  superior.  In  this  respect  they  are 
much  more  accurate  and  reliable  than  figures  based  on 
titles.^ 

Civil  Employees   in  the  District  of  Columbia  Working  Full 
Time  and  Receiving  No  Allowance,  April  30,  1919* 

Services  involving  clerical,  ofifice,  or  commercial  w^ork    (ex- 
clusive of  statistics)  : 

Administrative  and  Supervisory  Clerical  Service  543 

Assessor  and  Appraiser  Service 80 

Court  Clerk  and  Docket  Service   81 

Departmental   Publications  and  Information   Service    . . .  1,030 

Fiscal  and  Accounting  Service    6,624 

Mail,  File,  and  Record  Service    18,044 

Messenger   Service    3,433 

Office   Appliance   Operating   Service    2,057 

Personnel   Service    1,277 

Specialized  Business  Service    624 

Supply   and   Equipment   Service    3,^79 

Telephone  and  Telegraph  Operating  Service   510 

Typing,    Stenographic,    Correspondence,    and    Secretarial 

Service    1 5,929 

Miscellaneous  Clerical  Service  5,737 

Total    59,148 

Services   involving   the   skilled   trades,    manual    labor,    public 
safety,  or  related  work : 

Custodial  and  Janitor  Service   3,9o8 

Detention  and  Reformatory   Service    36 

Domestic  Service  198 

Engineman  Service   611 

Farm,  Garden,  and  Park  Maintenance  Service   347 

Fire   Service   634 

Investigational  and  Inspectional   Service    160 

Marine  Operating  Service    13 

Police  and  Criminal  Investigation  Service 892 

Printing  Trades  Service   7,7i7 

*  For  an  interesting  demonstration  of  how  meaningless  position  titles 
inthe  government  service  are,  see  the  report  of  the  Reclassification  Com- 
mission, Part  I,  p.  44,  et  seq. 

'  For  a  more  detailed  statement,  see  Appendix,  Table  III. 


i6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Civil   Employees   in   the   District  of   Columbia   Working  Full 
Time  and  Receiving  No  Allowance,  April  30,  1919 — Continued    • 

Skilled  Trades  and  Labor  Service : 

Chauffeur  450 

General  Carpenter  302 

Electrician    167 

Elevator  Conductor  256 

Laborer     1,069 

Freight   Handler    493 

Mail  Bag  Sewer   113 

Mailer  and  Wrapper  141 

Helper,  Mechanical  Trades  407 

Packer     132 

Teamster    175 

Shop   Porter    1,112 

Laboratory     100 

Other  classe*    i)530               6,447 

Total   20,963 

Services   involving  scientific,  technical,  professional,  or   sub- 
sidiary work :  1 

Actuarial    Service    8 

Agricultural  Promotion  and  Extension  Service   252 

Architectural  Service   288 

Arts  Service   468 

Biological   Science   Service    537 

Chaplain  Service    2 

Community  and  Recreation  Service 41 

Economic   and   Political    Science    Service    156 

Educational   Service    2,058 

Engineering  Service   2,072 

Law    and    Examiner    Service    2,712 

Library   Service    619 

Medical   Science  Service    136 

Nursing    Service    56 

Patent  Service    435 

Physical   Science   Service    889 

Social  Science  Service  349 

Statistical   Service    ^  3)243 

Translating  Service  124 

Total    14,445 

Grand  Total   94,5S6 


^  All  but  103  of  these  are  in  statistical  clerical  or  mechanical  tabulation 
work. 


INTRODUCTORY  17 

Women  in  the  Executive  Civil  Service. — The  extent  to  ) 
which  women  are  or  may  be  employed  in  a  service  has  an  im- 
portant bearing  on  many  problems  of  personnel  administra- 
tion. The  earlier  history  of  the  employment  of  women  in 
the  federal  civil  service  is  given  in  a  letter  from  Charles  Lyman, 
Civil  Service  Commissioner  'to  Hon.  Henry  W.  Blair  of  the 
House  of  Representatives,  dated  June  19,  1894.  The  letter 
reads  in  part  as  follows : 

Women  were  first  employed  in  the  public  service  in  Wash- 
ington under  authorization  of  law  in  1862,  at  a  compensation 
,  of  $600  per  annum,  and  in  the  office  of  the  Treasurer  of  the 
United  States,  under  General  Spinner.^  Previous  to  that  time 
a  few  women  had  been  employed  temporarily  in  the  ofifice  of 
the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  not,  however,  in  a  clerical  ca- 
pacity, but  in  the  mechanical  labor  of  clipping  the  fractional 
currency. 

Shortly  after  the  organization  of  the  Internal  Revenue 
Bureau  in  August,  1862,  probably  as  early  as  the  ist  of  Janu- 
ary, 1863,  and  perhaps  earlier,  a  few  women  were  employed 
in  that  bureau  at  a  salary  of  $600  per  annum.  Subsequently 
the  salaries  of  women  were  increased  in  the  appropriation 
acts  to  $720  per  annum  and  to  $900  per  annum ;  and  for  a 
number  of  years  no  w^omen  were  employed  at  a  salary  above 
$900,  and  that  grade  was  practically  monopolized  by  them, 
but  few  men  being  appointed  thereto.  In  a  few  instances 
women  were  promoted  to  $1,000  and  $1,200  salaries,  and  even 
to  higher  grades,  before  the  passage  of  the  civil  service  law; 
but  these  cases  were  rare  exceptions. 

The  effect  of  the  Civil  Service  law,  however,  aided  by  a 
gradual  change  in  public  sentiment  in  relation  to  the  employ- 
ment of  women  in  occupations  before  monopolized  by  men, 
has  been  to  open  to  women  in  the  public  service  the  higher 
grades;  and  at  the  present  time  (June  14,  1894),  a  large  num- 
ber of  women  have  won  their  way,  in  competition  with  men, 
into  the  more  lucrative  and  responsible  places  in  that  service. 

Since  promotions  in  the  departments  have  been  made  on 
the  basis  of  efficiency  records  kept  in  the  departments,  and  the 
more  or  less  close  competitive  tests  which  have  supplemented 
those  records,  there  has  been  a  decided  increase  in  the  propor- 

^A  letter  from  General  Spinner  to  Colonel  Frank  Jones,  written  in 
1886,  states  that  these  women  were  employed  in  trimming  and  counting 
bank  notes,  v/hich  they  could  do  better  and  cheaper  than  men. 


i8  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

tion  of  women  i)romoted,  which  shows  that  when  w'omen  in 
the  pubhc  service  have  a  fair  and  even  chance  with  the  men, 
they  win  their  full  share  of  the  lucrative  and  responsible  po- 
sitions. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  the  employment  of  women  in  the 
public  service  has,  on  the  whole,  had  a  beneficial  effect  upon 
that  service,  and  has  measurably  increased  its  efficiency.  .  .  . 

For  1907  the  Bureau  of  the  Census  published  fairly  com- 
plete statistics  regarding  the  number  of  w^omen  employed,  their 
salaries,  and  their  occupations  as  w'ell  as  their  age,  marital 
condition,  and  length,  of  service.  This  compilation  showed 
that  on  July  i,  1907,  there  was  a  total  of  13,821  women  in  the 
civil  service,  of  whom  7,358  were  employed  in  the  District 
of  Columbia  and  6,463  elsewhere.  The  number  employed 
in  the  District  of  Columbia  represented  somewhat  less  than 
8  per  cent  of  the  total  number  of  government  employees  there 
employed  and  they  w^ere  of  far  less  relative  importance  among 
employees  outside  of  Washington.  The  tendency  of  the  years 
immediately  preceding  the  war  was  undoubtedly  tow^ard  a  sub- 
stantial increase  in  the  employment  of  women,  and  the  war 
brought  a  great  influx  into  the  government  service  of  women 
•war  workers.  Within  tw^o  years  the  number  of  employees  in 
the  service  at  Washington  more  than  doubled  and  the  greater 
part  of  this  body  of  new  employees  were  women. 

The  Congressional  Joint  Commission  on  Reclassification 
of  Salaries  compiled  statistics  regarding  the  sex  of  the  em- 
ployees in  the  numerically  important  classes  in  the  service  at 
Washington.  All  classes  containing  100  or  more  employees 
were  taken ;  and  for  these  classes  the  percentage  of  the  total 
made  up  of  women  was  approximately  62.  in  other  words, 
three  employees  out  of  five  in  these  classes  were  women.  The 
figures  for  each  of  these  numerically  important  classes  are 
given  below.  It  will  be  noted  that  all  the  large  clerical  classes 
and  the  educational  classes  have  been  included  and  that  the 
proportion  of  women  is  very  high  in  such  classes.  If  the 
smaller  classes  had  been  included,  the  proportion  of  women 
would  have  been  reduced  considerably.^ 

*  See  Appendix,  Table  III. 


PART  I 

THE  ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICS  FROM  THE 
EXECUTIVE  CIVIL  SERVICE 

CHAPTER  II 

INTRODUCTORY 

Dual  Character  of  the  Federal  Personnel  Problem. — The 
federal  personnel  problem,  like  the  problem  of  any  public 
personnel  system,  is  both  a  political  and  an  administrative 
one.  The  political  problem  is  purely  a  negative  one — how  to 
exclude  from  the  workings  of  the  personnel  system  the  in- 
fluence of  politics  and  of  politicians.  Not  until  this  problem 
has  been  substantially  solved  can  the  positive  and  technical 
problems  of  personnel  administration,  or  indeed  of  admin- 
istration generally,  be  successfully  attacked.  As  was  force- 
fully stated  by  Franklin  MacVeagh,  Secretary  of  the  Treas- 
ury, in  1910,  in  discussing  the  problem  of  administrative  im- 
provement in  his  department : 

Any  one,  however,  who  comes  close  to  the  practical  admin- 
istration of  the  Federal  Government — or  of  any  other  gov- 
ernment— soon  becomes  aware  that  everything  ultimate  or  final 
in  the  excellence  of  administration  must  wait  upon  the  com- 
plete inclusion  of  all  non-political  offices  within  the  classified 
service,  and  that  progress  in  the  administration  meanwhile  will 
materially  depend  upon  the  broadening  of  that  service.^ 

^Quoted  in  the  Twenty-seventh  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil 
Service  Commission  (1910),  p.  137.  As  will  be  shown  in  the  following 
chapters,  the  inclusion  of  all  non-political  officers  in  the  "classirted  service," 
using  that  term  technically,  is  not  indispensable.  What  is  essential  is  that 
their  selection  be  placed  upon  a  formal  merit  basis.  This  can  be  accom- 
plished without  their  inclusion  in  the  classified  service,  very  desirable 
though  such  inclusion  would  be. 

19 


20  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

There  is  a  too  easy  and  general  assumption  that  in  the 
federal  service  this  problem  of  entirely  divorcing  the  admin- 
istration of  personnel  matters  from  politics  has  been  met  with 
substantial  completeness.  Such  is  far  from  the  case.  The 
present  volume  is  accordingly  divided  into  two  parts — the 
first  dealing  with  the  measures  necessary  to  effect  the  complete 
divorce  of  the  personnel  system  from  politics,  the  second  with 
the  problem  of  personnel  administration  proper.  Necessarily, 
however,  even  in  the  second  section  consideration  must  be 
given  at  many  points  to  the  safeguarding  of  personnel  meth- 
ods from  political  influence,  for  not  only  has  the  complete 
expulsion  of  politics  from  the  personnel  system  contended  for 
in  the  first  section  not  yet  been  achieved;  but  even  if  it  had 
been,  there  would  be  need  of  eternal  vigilance  to  prevent  its  re- 
entry. 

Elimination  of  the  Political  Factor  in  Selection  the  Pirst 
Essential  to  an  Efficient  Personnel  System. — In  any  at- 
tempt to  divorce  a  public  personnel  system  from  politics 
or  related  improper  forces,  the  obvious  point  of  attack  is 
the  system  of  selection.  So  long  as  politics  dominates,  or 
has  any  substantial  influence  in,  the  process  of  initial  re- 
cruitment no  substantial  progress  can  be  made  in  eliminat- 
ing it  from  the  administration  of  the  personnel  system 
proper.  Only  when  the  entire  administrative  personnel, 
and  in  particular  the  directing  personnel,  are  originally 
selected  wholly  without  regard  to  political  or  cognate 
influence  will  it  be  possible  to  eliminate  political  influence 
in  assignment,  promotion,  demotion,  increases  or  reductions 
of  salary,  removals,  retirement,  and  other  substantive  matters. 
To  discuss  at  length  the  evils  which  flow  from  the  selec- 
tion of  the  administrative  personnel  of  the  government  on 
political  grounds  instead  of  on  merit  is  unnecessary.  They 
are  too  obvious  and  too  widely  recognized.  It  should  be 
pointed  out,  however,  that  the  entrance  of  politics  into  the 
'.  selection  of  employees  is  far  more  serious  when  it  affects  local 
offices  than  when  it  affects  the  offices  at  Washington.  The 
local  employee  who  is  selected   for  political  reasons  remains 


INTRODUCTORY  21 

an  active  political  factor,  at  all  times  more  or  less  under  the  "^ 
eye  of  those  politicians  to  whom  he  owes  his  place,  and  politics 
attends  his  footsteps  at  every  point  in  his  official  history.  The 
officer  or  employee  who  receives  appointment  at  Washington, 
on  the  other  hand,  frequently  becomes  of  no  account  as  a  di- 
rect political  factor,  and,  in  time,  may  lose  any  outstanding 
character  as  a  political  appointee  and  be  hardly  distinguishable 
from  those  who  entered  the  service  entirely  by  merit. 

Again,  from  the  standpoint  of  personnel  administration, 
it  should  be  noted  that  the  selection  of  the  directing  personnel 
by  politics,  while  the  subordinate  personnel  are  selected  on  a 
merit  basis,  has  an  evil  influence  far  out  of  proportion  to  the 
actual  numbers  of  the  directing  personnel.  In  the  first  place, 
the  political  selection  of  the  directing  personnel  obviously 
means  that  they  are  selected  from  outside  the  service  and,  con- 
sequently, advancement  to  higher  posts  in  the  service  is  barred 
to  the  permanent  subordinate  personnel,  except  in  those  in- 
stances, fortunately  few,  in  which  the  permanent  employee 
is  also  active  in  politics.  This  is  notoriously  the  condition  in 
the  federal  service  at  the  present  time.  Only  in  the  strictly 
technical  services  is  the  chief  directing  personnel  now  nor- 
mally selected  on  merit.  The  geologist  may  become  Director 
of  the  Geological  Survey,  the  physician,  Surgeon  General  of 
the  Public  Health  Service.  Once  the  strictly  technical  serv- 
ices are  left  behind,  however,  the  situation  changes  abruptly. 
The  customs  inspector  or  appraiser  can  never  become,  in  the 
ordinary  course.  Collector  of  Customs,  the  immigrant  inspector, 
Commissioner  of  Immigration,  the  clerk  or  examiner  in  the 
internal  revenue  office,  Collector  of  Internal  Revenue.  Simi- 
larly, in  the  services  at  Washington  which  are  not  strictly 
technical,  the  clerk,  examiner,  or  minor  executive,  who,  through 
long  service  and  innate  ability,  has  qualified  himself  for  ad- 
ministrative work  of  the  first  order  is  barred  from  the  head- 
ship of  the  service,  from  the  deputy  headship,  and,  very  fre- 
quently, from  several  of  the  other  more  important  adminis- 
trative positions  at  the  top  of  the  service,  not  to  mention  the 
assistant  secretaryship  of  the  department.     Occasional  excep- 


22  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

tions  are  found  to  this  rule ;  but  they  are  not  frequent  enough 
really  to  color  the  picture.  It  thus  may  be  said  with  sub- 
stantial accuracy  that  one  entering  the  service  of  the  govern- 
ment in  a  minor  administrative,  statistical,  or  legal  capacity 
has  no  reasonable  expectation  of  rising  to  the  head  of  the 
service. 

The  second  reason  why  the  political  selection  of  the  direct- 
ing employees  is  so  disastrous  is  that  such  officers  must,  in 
any  system,  be  permitted  a  large  measure  of  discretion  in  their 
control  over  the  fortunes  of  the  subordinate  personnel,  par- 
ticularly with  respect  to  such  matters  as  assignment,  transfer, 
promotion,  salary  increases,  and  the  like.  Where  the  admin- 
istrative officer,  himself  a  political  appointee,  is  vested  with 
authority  in  these  matters,  his  action  in  respect  to  them,  how- 
ever honorable,  and  however  single  in  its  purpose  to  advance 
the  good  of  the  service,  is  always  open  to  the  suspicion  of 
having  been  dictated  by  political  considerations.  The  destruc- 
tive effect  of  this  atmosphere  of  suspicion  on  the  morale  of 
the  subordinate  personnel  need  not  be  enlarged  upon. 

Closely  related  to  this  aspect  of  the  matter  is  the  fact  that, 
where  the  directing  personnel  are  admittedly  political  ap- 
pointees, they  naturally,  and  indeed  almost  inevitably,  con- 
tinue to  be  politically  active  while  in  public  office.  At  the 
same  time  nothing  is  better  established  than  that  the  success 
of  a  public  personnel  system  demands  that  severe  restrictions 
be  placed  upon  the  political  activity  of  permanent  non-political 
employees.  But  the  difficulty  of  enforcing  these  restrictions 
upon  the  subordinate  personnel  through  the  medium  of  a  su- 
perior who  is  himself,  in  the  nature  of  the  case,  primarily  in- 
terested in  the  maintenance  of  political  activity,  is  readily 
imagined.  Even  where  the  political  head  of  the  establishment 
takes  no  step  to  encourage  it,  and  even  in  fact  where  he  may 
publicly  announce  his  opposition  to  it,  there  is  always  the 
temptation  to  the  employee  so  minded  to  believe  that  a  judi- 
cious amount  of  political  activity  would  be  acceptable  to  the 
head.  Despite  severe  regulations  to  the  contrary,  therefore, 
it  has  been  found  impossible  in  the  federal  service  entirely  to 


INTRODUCTORY  23 

suppress  political  activity  among  the  subordinate  employees 
of  those  local  offices  in  which  the  heads  are  political  appointees. 

Pernicious  as  the  appointment  of  the  directing  personnel 
is  from  any  administrative  standpoint,  it  is  especially  baneful 
in  its  effects  on  personnel  administration.  The  political  ap- 
pointee, however  able  an  administrator  he  may  be  in  gen- 
eral, is  seldom  able  to  administer  personnel  matters  as  effec- 
tively as  the  permanent  non-political  officer.  The  reason  is 
that,  not  having  himself  served  in  the  ranks,  and  made  the 
service  his  life  work,  he  finds  it  difficult  to  put  himself  in  the 
position  of  the  employee,  and  indeed  not  infrequently  does  not 
think  it  necessary  to  do  so.  It  is  undoubtedly  largely  on  this 
score  that  the  failure  of  the  federal  personnel  system  to  de- 
velop along  advanced  lines,  even  within  the  area  where  Con- 
gress has  permitted  the  President  and  the  departmental  of- 
ficers wide  latitude,  is  to  be  explained.  The  effective  devel- 
opment of  personnel  policies  is  not  reasonably  to  be  expected 
from  political  careerists,  however  well  intentioned. 

The  evil  results  of  the  political  selection  of  subordinate 
employees  need  only  be  mentioned  to  be  recognized.  Looked 
at  solely  from  the  standpoint  of  the  personnel  system,  such 
selection  means  inefficient  service,  improper  control  by  the 
heads  of  the  service  through  inability  to  remove  or  demote 
those  appointed  for  political  reasons,  unfairness  in  promotion, 
advancement,  and  the  like,  and  the  weakening  of  the  morale 
of  the  non-political  personnel,  which  follows  as  a  necessary 
result. 

In  presenting  the  evil  results  which  flow  from  political 
selection,  and  particularly  when  attention  is  directed  to  a  spe- 
cific case  or  to  the  case  of  a  specific  individual,  it  is  easy  to 
get  the  impression  that  the  evil  done  in  that  particular  case  is 
slight:  especially  is  this  so  if  the  position  to  which  entrance  is 
thus  given  without  competition  or  other  test  of  merit  is  one 
of  minor  importance.  It  must  always  be  remembered,  how- 
ever, that  one  who  enters  service  through  political  influence 
quite  frequently,  as  is  indeed  natural,  secures  much  more  rapid 
advancement  in  the  service  than  do  his  or  her  associates  who 


^zx 


jk' 


24  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

have  entered  by  the  competitive  route  and  have  no  poHtical 
or  other  influence  to  assist  them  in  their  efforts  for  promo- 
tion. The  influence  of  poHtical  assistance  thus  projects  itself 
far  beyond  the  mere  entrance  gate  and  is  likely  to  endure 
throughout  the  entire  service  history  of  the  political  appointee 
as  a  factor  making  for  justified  resentment  and  discontent 
among  non-political  employees. 

Means  of  Elimination  of  the  Political  Factor. — The 
measures  which  may  be  taken  to  eliminate  politics  from  initial 
selection,  and,  in  general,  to  efifect  the  divorce  of  the  personnel 
system  from  politics  fall  into  two  distinct  classes.  In  the 
first  class  are  those  which  limit  more  or  less  completely  the 
discretion  of  the  administrative  officer  in  matters  of  personnel, 
substituting  for  such  discretion  methods  of  a  mechanical  or 
formal  character.  Here  the  effort  is  to  prevent  the  abuse  of 
administrative  discretion  for  political  purposes  by  destroying 
that  discretion  in  greater  or  less  degree.  In  the  second  class 
are  those  measures  which  seek  to  prevent  administrative  of- 
ficers and  employees  from  undue  political  activity  and  con- 
versely to  prevent  politicians  outside  the  administration  from 
attempting  to  influence  the  action  of  the  administrator  in 
personnel  matters.  Here  tlie  attempt  is  not  to  limit  adminis- 
trative discretion  but  to  protect  it  as  fully  as  possible  from 
contact  with  political  influences. 

Abstract  theory  would  seem  to  demand  that,  so  far  as 
practicable,  reliance  be  placed  on  measures  of  the  second  class; 
for  the  limitation  of  administrative  discretion  is  plainly  in  itself 
an  evil,  to  be  endured  only  because  it  is  a  less  evil  than  the 
use  of  that  discretion  for  political  ends.  Experience  has 
proved,  however,  that  whatever  the  value  of  measures  of  the 
second  type,  the  chief  measure  which  must  be  relied  on  to 
effect  the  divorce  from  politics  of  a  personnel  system  which 
has  long  been  wedded  to  politics  is  to  substitute  for  adminis- 
trative discretion  in  selection  a  formal  system  of  selection, 
preferably  based  on  open  competitive  examination.  The  in- 
stitution of  such  methods  of  selection,  therefore,  has  come  to 
be  accepted  as  the  characteristic  and  central  measure  of  any 


INTRODUCTORY  25 

program  to  cleanse  the  public  personnel  system  of  political 
influences ;  and  it  is  to  the  present  extent  and  incidence  of 
such  methods  in  the  federal  service  that  attention  will  primarily 
be  given  in  the  chapters  immediately  following.  The  limi- 
tations on  administrative  discretion  with  respect  to  removals, 
a  matter  closely  bound  up  with  that  of  selection,  will  also  be 
reviewed.  Then  will  be  considered  what  may,  and  should  be, 
done  in  the  direction  of  preventing  contact  between  the  admin- 
istrative personnel,  both  superior  and  subordinate,  and  the 
politician. 

In  the  first  of  the  succeeding  chapters  are  reviewed  the 
varied  legal  provisions  by  which  formal  systems  of  selection 
for  appointment  have  been  applied  to  the  several  branches  of 
the  federal  service;  in  the  following  chapter  the  areas  of  the 
service  to  which  no  such  methods  have  been  applied  are  ex- 
amined in  detail  and  a  program  for  the  application  of  such 
methods  to  those  areas  is  developed. 


I 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  LAW  AND  TRADITION  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE 

The  Civil  Service  Reform  Movement. — The  body  of  law 
and  practice  designed  to  prevent  the  entrance  of  political  and 
other  improper  considerations  into  the  process  of  selection  is, 
in  the  main,  the  product  of  a  great  popular  movement  in  the 
seventies  and  eighties.  To  review  the  details  of  the  history 
of  that  movement  would  be  of  little  value  for  the  present 
purpose.  It  is  of  interest,  however,  to  point  out  that  the  enact- 
ment of  the  civil  service  law,  and  the  subsequent  development 
of  regulations  and  procedure  making  it  effective,  were  forced 
to  successful  issue  by  a  powerful  popular  support  in  the  face 
of  determined  opposition  from  those  in  control  of  party  and 
of  government.  The  force  behind  that  support  was  the  more 
remarkable  because  it  represented  the  economic  or  social  as- 
pirations of  no  particular  group  of  the  community.  It  may 
be  said  of  it,  as  of  few  other  forces  in  our  political  history, 
that  it  sprang  from  a  moral  or  idealistic  revolt  on  the  part  of 
citizens  of  all  such  groups,  against  a  system  which  debauched 
and  degraded  political  life.  Unquestionably,  this  force  sur- 
vives in  no  negligible  degree  to  this  day;  but  springing  from, 
and  nourished  by,  the  abuses  which  it  attacked,  it  has  weak- 
ened in  proportion  as  those  abuses  have  disappeared. 
Types  of  Systems  of  Formal  Selection. — The  systems  of 
formal  selection  which  may  be  established,  and  which  indeed 
have  been  established  over  various  areas  of  the  federal  serv- 
ice, may  differ  widely  in  the  degree  to  which  they  impose  re- 
striction upon  the  discretion  of  the  appointing  officer  in  mak- 
ing selection.  In  some  state  and  municipal  jurisdictions  the 
law  and  the  practice  have  gone  to  an  extreme  in  excluding  the 
administrative  authorities  from  any  participation  whatever  in 

26 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         27 

the  administration  of  the  selective  system.  In  the  federal  serv- 
ice this  extreme  position  has  never  been  taken  and,  as  will 
subsequently  appear,  there  are  substantial  variations  in  the 
degree  to  which  participation  of  the  appointing  officer  in  the 
selection  process  is  permitted  at  different  points  of  the  service. 
The  general  development  in  the  federal  service  undoubtedly 
has  been  consistently  in  the  direction  of  narrowing  discretion 
in  selections. 

Three  rather  obvious  factors  determine  the  degree  of  limi- 
tation which  the  system  places  upon  the  discretion  of  the  ad- 
ministrative officers :  first,  the  extent  to  which  the  right  is  ac- 
corded to  all  who  may  wish  to  apply  to  place  on  record  their 
qualifications  and  claims  to  appointment;  second,  the  extent  to 
which  selection  from  among  those  admitted  to  application  is 
determined  by  a  competitive  weighing  of  qualifications;  and 
third,  the  extent  to  which  the  procedure  is  under  the  sur- 
veillance or  control  of  an  authority  outside  of  the  appointing 
power. 

A  fourth  factor  which  might  be  mentioned  is  the  extent 
of  publicity  which  prevails  in  the  actual  operation  of  what- 
ever system  is  prescribed. 

The  System  of  Pass  Examinations. — The  system  which 
least  limits  the  discretion  of  the  administrative  officer  is  the 
so-called  pass  examination,  administered  by  the  appointing  of- 
ficer himself.  This  system  merely  requires  that  no  appoint- 
ment shall  be  made  until  the  prospective  appointee  has  passed 
a  set  test.  If  the  service  to  which  it  is  applied  is  small  and 
appointments  infrequent,  this  system  entails  virtually  no  limi- 
tation upon  the  discretion  of  the  appointing  officer,  as  he  him- 
self decides  whether  the  prospective  appointee  has  passed.  If, 
however,  the  service  is  large  and  appointments  frequent,  the 
appointing  officer  will  have  to  delegate  the  actual  conduct  of 
the  examinations  to  a  subordinate  acting  under  formal  in- 
structions, and  a  measure  of  practical  restriction  on  the  dis- 
cretion of  the  appointing  officer  may  thus  be  secured,  though 
without  legal  sanction.  Under  this  method,  not  only  is  se- 
lection  from  among  the  applicants  not  competitive,  but  no 


28  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

provision  is  made  for  inviting  applications  from  all  who  choose. 
Such  a  provision,  in  the  absence  of  competitive  selection  from 
among  those  applying,  may  be  thought  empty  and  futile.  Such 
is  not  altogether  the  case.  If  applications  are  invited  from 
all  who  choose  to  apply,  a  moral  obligation  is  imposed  upon 
the  appointing  officer  at  least  not  to  examine  an  applicant 
clearly  unfit,  or  even  one  of  questionable  fitness,  while  failing 
to  examine  one  of  distinguished  qualifications;  and,  if  there 
be  any  measurable  publicity  given  to  the  several  applications, 
even  if  confined  to  the  department  concerned,  this  moral  obli- 
gation may  possess  some  practical  force.  The  present  sys- 
tems of  selection  for  the  foreign  service  and  for  the  medical 
officers  of  the  Public  Health  Service  are  examples  of  the 
method  here  under  discussion ;  and  in  both,  the  fact  that  the 
right  to  make  formal  application  for  examination  is  publicly 
held  out  to  all,  undoubtedly  constitutes  a  limitation  upon  the 
freedom  of  selection  of  the  appointing  officers. 
The  System  of  Competitive  Examinations:  Selected  Ap- 
plicants.— Conversely,  it  is  possible  to  devise  a  method  by 
which  application  for  examination  is  not  open  to  all  but  selec- 
tion for  appointment  as  a  result  of  examination  is  nevertheless 
competitive.  Under  such  a  system  it  is  the  function  of  the 
appointing  officer  to  designate  for  examination,  entirely  in  his 
own  discretion,  a  number  of  candidates  somewhat  in  excess 
of  the  respective  number  of  vacancies,  leaving  to  the  results  of 
a  competitive  examination,  whether  conducted  by  the  appoint- 
ing power  or  by  independent  authority,  the  selection  of  ap- 
pointees to  fill  those  vacancies.  This  method,  offering  as  it 
does  a  measure  of  competition,  and  yet  allowing  the  appoint- 
ing officer  discretion  to  ]>ar  from  the  examination  any  one 
not  satisfactory  to  him,  has  been  developed  in  but  few  per- 
sonnel systems  and  is  not  found  at  any  innnt  in  the  federal 
service. 

The  System  of  Competitive  Examinations:  Open  to  All. 
— The  final  type  of  selective  system,  and  the  one  which  restricts 
most  severely  the  discretion  of  the  appointing  officer,  is  the 
open  competitive  system — a  system  in  which  the  right  to  enter 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         29 

the  competition  is  open  to  all  who  apply,  and  the  selection  is 
determined  by  the  results  of  the  competition. 

The  open  competitive  system  is  commonly  regarded  as  the 
only  method  to  be  employed  if  political  considerations  are  to 
be  excluded  from  selection.  Despite  the  essential  soundness 
of  this  view,  it  is  possible,  as  will  appear  in  subsequent  pages, 
under  certain  conditions,  wholly  to  eliminate  politics  from 
selections  by  the  employment  of  one  of  the  other  methods 
mentioned.  Nevertheless,  any  other  method  than  that  of  open 
competition  is  liable  to  spring  a  leak  unless  the  conditions  are 
of  the  best.  Hence,  it  is  believed  that,  unless  for  adminis- 
trative reasons  the  method  of  open  competition  is  imprac- 
ticable, that  method  should  be  applied  in  preference  to  any  of 
the  other  formal  methods  of  selection  discussed. 
The  Appointing  Power. — In  setting  forth,  as  this  chapter 
purposes  to  do,  the  varied  provisions  of  law  and  regulation 
under  which  formal  methods  of  selection  have  been  applied 
to,  or  excluded  from,  the  several  branches  of  the  federal  serv- 
ice, it  is  necessary  that  the  basic  constitutional  and  legal  as- 
pects of  the  power  of  appointment,  and  of  the  term  and  tenure 
of  office  should  first  be  understood. 

With  respect  to  a  very  small  number  of  the  positions  in 
the  executive  civil  service  the  Constitution  expressly  desig- 
nates who  shall  appoint.  These  are  "ambassadors,  other  pub- 
lic ministers,  and  consuls."  Under  the  Constitution  they  must 
be  nominated  by  the  President,  and  appointed  by  him  by  and 
with  the  advice  ^nd  consent  of  the  Senate. 

As  to  all  others,  it  is  provided  that  "all  other  officers  .  .  . 
which  shall  be  established  by  law"  shall  be  similarly  appointed 
by  the  President  by  and  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the 
Senate,  but  that  "the  Congress  may  by  law  vest  the  appoint- 
ment of  such  inferior  officers,  as  they  think  proper,  in  the 
President  alone,  in  the  courts  of  law,  or  in  the  heads  of  de- 
partments." 

This  provision,  it  will  be  noted  at  the  outset,  ^-efers  only 
to  "officers."  It  is,  however,  settled  law  that  not  every  per- 
son holding  employment  under  the  United  States  is  an  "of- 


30  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

ficer."  As  distinguished  from  an  "officer,"  one  may  be  an 
"employee"  or  an  "agent"  of  the  United  States;  and  to  such 
this  constitutional  restriction  as  to  method  of  appointment  does 
not  apply.  Just  what  characteristics  a  position  held  under 
the  United  States  must  possess  to  render  the  incumbent  an 
"officer"  rather  than  an  employee  or  agent  has  never  been 
determined.  The  broad  distinction  is,  of  course,  a  clear  and 
obvious  one,  but  the  zone  in  which  it  cannot  be  sharply  drawn 
is  wide.  For  the  present  purpose,  however,  it  is  sufficient  to 
note  that  only  with  respect  to  "officers"  is  the  appointing  power- 
located  by  the  Constitution,  The  power  to  appoint  employees 
and  agents  is  regulated  wholly  by  statute,  for  the  Constitution 
is  silent. 

Within  the  class  of  "officers,"  it  should  further  be  noted, 
it  is  only  "inferior"  officers  whose  appointment  Congress  may 
vest  in  one  of  the  three  agencies  designated  instead  of  in  the 
President  and  Senate.  What  is  an  "inferior"  officer  under 
this  provision  has  never  been  judicially  determined.  It  would 
seem  clear  that  a  "head  of  department"  cannot  reasonably  ^be 
considered  an  "inferior"  officer;  but  any  officer  subordinate  to 
the  head  of  a  department  could  apparently  be  so  regarded  and 
his  appointment  could  constitutionally  be  vested  in  the  Presi- 
dent alone,  in  a  court  of  law,  or  in  the  head  of  a  department. 

If  this  reasoning  is  correct,  the  Constitution  requires  that 
the  method  of  nomination  by  the  President,  and  appointment 
by  him  "by  and  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate" 
shall  be  used  only  in  the  case  of  "ambassadors,  other  public 
ministers,  and  consuls"  (where  it  is  explicitly  required)  and  in 
the  case  of  "heads  of  departments"  (where  it  is  impliedly,  but 
no  less  clearly,  required).  The  appointment  of  all  other  "of- 
ficers" may  be  vested  in  any  one  of  four  authorities,  as  des- 
ignated by  Congress,  namely  (i)  the  President,  with  the  advice 
and  consent  of  the  Senate,  (2)  the  President  alone,  (3)  the 
heads  of  departments,  and  (4)  the  courts  of  law;  while  the 
appointment  of  all  employees  and  agents  who  do  not  fall  under 
the  head  of  officers  may  be  vested  in  any  authority  whatever 
that  Congress  may  designate. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         31 

Criticism  of  this  scheme  of  control  over  the  allocation  of 
the  appointing  power  is,  of  course,  wholly  academic,  yet  it  is 
of  interest  in  the  light  of  the  development  that  has  actually 
taken  place.  Senatorial  confirmation  of  ambassadors  and 
consuls  resulted,  and  in  a  measure  still  results,  in  the  per- 
sistence of  spoils  in  the  foreign  service  long  beyond  what 
would  probably  otherwise  have  been  the  case,  but  the  fatal 
weakness  of  the  arrangement  is  that  it  permits,  and  indeed  by 
the  implication  of  the  language  strongly  supports,  the  intru- 
sion of  senatorial  confirmation  in  the  appointment  of  all  classes  ■ 
of  officers.  Had  this  provision  of  the  Constitution  been 
omitted,  the  history  of  political  institutions  in  the  United 
States  might  have  been  materially  changed  for  the  better. 
This  is  not  the  place,  however,  for  any  extended  review  of 
this  subject.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  hardly  is  a  single  instance 
to  be  found  in  which  the  participation  of  the  Senate  has  worked  ^ 
for  good,  and  innumerable  instances  can  be  cited  in  which  it 
has  worked  for  the  selection  of  the  unfit,  the  removal  of  the 
fit,  and,  at  almost  all  points,  for  the  persistence  of  politics 
in  appointment  and  removal  long  after  the  President  was 
willing  and  eager  to  be  guided  by  considerations  of  merit 
only. 

Aside  from  this  primary  weakness,  the  constitutional 
scheme  as  a  whole  is  open  to  criticism  as  vesting  in  the  legis- 
lative branch  a  power  which  is  essentially  executive.  The 
Constitution  imposes  upon  the  President  the  duty  of  seeing 
"that  the  laws  are  duly  enforced."  A  natural  implication  of 
this  responsibility  would  be  the  power  to  select  the  agents  by 
whom  the  law  is  to  be  enforced.  Consistency  would  thus  re- 
quire that  the  entire  power  of  appointment  should  be  vested 
in  the  President,  who  would  exercise  it  either  directly  or  by 
delegating  it  to  agents  of  his  own  selection.  In  practice,  in- 
deed, this  has  been  substantially  the  result,  but  the  Constitution 
does  not  insure  it.  Not  only  may  the  appointment  of  "of- 
ficers" be  required  by  Congress  to  receive  the  consent  of  the 
Senate,  but  it  may  be  vested  to  begin  within  the  courts  of  law, 


32  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

an  independent  branch  of  the  government.^  Thus  it  is  per- 
fectly possible  for  Congress  completely  to  exclude  the  Presi- 
dent from  all  legal  control  over  the  appointment,  or  the  ma- 
chinery of  selection,  of  most  of  the  personnel  of  the  govern- 
ment. As  indicated,  the  actual  development  under  both  these 
heads,  however,  has  placed  the  whole  of  the  appointing  power 
(except  as  it  is  cjualified  by  senatorial  confirmation)  in  the 
hands  of  -the  President  or  his  appointees  at  first  or  second 
remove. 

Presidential  Positions. — Nearly  the  whole  body  of  law; 
relating  both  to  methods  of  selection  and  to  tenure  is  based 
upon  the  distinction  between  what  are  known  as  "presiden- 
tial" and  "non-presidential"  positions — that  is,  between  those 
positions  to  which  appointment  is  by  the  President  by  and 
with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate  and  those  to  which 
appointment  is  by  any  other  authority.  That  distinction, 
therefore,  must  be  developed  somewhat  fully  at  the  outset. 

Congress  has  by  no  means  limited  appointment  by  the 
President  with  the  "advice  and  consent"  of  the  Senate  to  the 
narrow  field  expressly  required  by  the  Constitution.  In  the 
military  and  naval  services  it  has  gone  farthest,  requiring  the 
"advice  and  consent"  of  the  Senate  to  be  obtained  to  the  ap- 
pointment of  every  officer,  even  of  the  lowest  grade.  In  the 
civil  service  it  has  been  less  thoroughgoing.  There,  in  the 
departments  at  Washington,  the  consent  of  the  Senate  has  been 
requi/ed,  with  few  exceptions,  only  in  the  case  of  the  heads 
and  assistant  heads  of  departments,  bureaus,  and  services. 
In  the  field  services,  on  the  other  hand,  Congress  has  been 
particularly  insistent  on  retaining  the  advice  and  consent 
of  the  Senate  in  the  appointment  of  officers  in  charge  of  local 
offices,  even  those  of  low  degree.  The  postmasters  of  all  of- 
fices showing  annual  receipts  of  $1,900  or  over  must  be  ap- 
pointed by  and  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate — 

'  Appointment  of  federal  officers  by  federal  judges  was  occasionally 
resorted  to  in  the  early  days  of  the  government.  It  survived  till  as  late  as 
1905  in  the  provision  for  the  meml^ership  of  the  United  States  circuit  judge 
on  the  board  of  appointment  of  inspectors  of  hulls  and  boilers  in  the 
Steamboat  Inspection  Service  (R.  S.  4415,  amended  by  Act  of  March  3, 
1905,  38  Stat.  iO->8\ 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         33 

though  the  number  has  grown  every  year  and  is  now  over 
10,000.  Similarly,  all  collectors  of  customs  and  internal  reve- 
nue, registers  and  receivers  at  land  offices,  surgeon  general, 
district  attorneys  and  marshals,  and  commissioned  officers  of 
the  Public  Health  Service  and  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey., 
must  be  confirmed  by  the  Senate. 

In  most  cases  wherein  appointment  is  made  by  the  Presi- 
dent with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate  that  method 
is  expressly  required  by  statute.  In  the  remainder  the  statute 
is  silent,  but  as  Congress  has  indicated  none  of  the  other  pos- 
sible methods,  appointment  by  the  President  with  the  advice 
and  consent  of  the  Senate  is  required  by  the  Constitution,^ 
since  the  position  involved  is  clearly  that  of  an  "officer."  ^ 

In  some  instances  the  statute  vests  the  appointment  in  the 
President  alone,  as  in  the  cases  of  the  Assistant  Secretaries  of 
Commerce  and  of  Labor,  the  Commissioner  and  Deputy  Com- 
missioner of  Lighthouses,  and  several  other  officers. 

The  following  is  a  list,  as  of  July  i,  1919,  of  the  "presi- 
dential" positions  in  the  executive  civil  service  recjuiring  con- 
firmation by  the  Senate : 

Department  of  State 
Secretary 
Undersecretary 
Assistant  Secretaries 
Ambassadors 
Ministers 

Secretaries  of  Embassy  or  Legation 
Consuls  General  at  Large 
Consuls  General 
Consular  Inspectors 
Consuls 

*  "The  general  rule  dediicible  from  this  provision  (Art.  II,  sec.  2,  of 
the  Constitution)  is  that,  in  the  absence  of  an  express  enactment  to  the 
contrary,  the  appointment  of  any  officer  of  the  United  States  belongs  to 
the  President,  by  and  with  the  advice  of  the  Senate."  Opinion  of  the 
Attorney  General,  June  i,  1911,  29  Op.  116. 

*  But  it  has  been  held  that  certain  technical  employees,  the  manner  of 
whose  appointment  is  not  specifically  provided  for,  are  properly  to  be 
regarded  as  clerks  rather  than  officers  and  as  coming  under  section  169  of 
the  Revised  Statutes,  which  authorizes  the  head  of  a  department  to  employ 
such  number  of  clerks,  etc.,  of  the  several  classes  recognized  by  law  as 
may  be  appropriated  for  by  Congress  from  year  to  year.  Opinion  of  the 
Attorney  General,  June  i,  191 1,  29  Op.  116. 


34  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Treasury  Department 

Secretary 

Assistant  Secretaries 

Solicitor 

Assistant  Solicitor 
Office  of  the  Treasurer 

Treasurer 

Assistant  Treasurer 

Deputy  Assistant  Treasurer 

Assistant  Treasurers ' 
Bureau  of  Internal  Revenue 

Commissioner 

Deputy  Commissioners 

Solicitor  y 

Collectors 
Customs  Service 

Collectors  of  Customs 

Surveyors  of  Customs 

Naval  Officers  of  Customs 

Board  of  General  Appraisers  of  Merchandise — Members 

Appraisers  of  Merchandise 

Assistant  Appraisers  of  Merchandise 

Special  Examiners  of  Drugs,  Medicines,  and  Chemicals 
War  Finance  Corporation 

Directors 
Office  of  Comptroller  of  the  Currency 

Comptroller 
United  States  Mint 

Director 

Superintendents  of  Mints 

Assayers  in  Charge  of  Mints 

Assayers 

Engraver 
Office  of  Register  of  the  Treasury 

Register 

Assistant  Register 
Public  Health  Service 

Commissioned  Medical  Officers 
Federal  Farm  Loan  Board 

Members 
Office  of  Comptroller  of  Treasury  * 

Comptroller  ^ 

Assistant  Comptroller  ^ 

'  These  were  in  charge  of  subtreasuries ;  offices  abolished  since  June 
30,  1919. 

^  Changed  to  General  Accounting-  Office,  by  Budget  and  Accounting 
Act  of  June   10,  1921,  and  made  an  independent  cstablislnnent. 

'  Changed  to  Comptroller  (jeneral  and  Assistant  Comptroller  General 
by  Budget  and  Accounting  Act  of  June  10,  1921. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE        35 

Trf.asury  Department — Continued 
Auditors 

Auditor  for  Treasury  Department  * 

Auditor  for  War  Department  * 

Auditor  for  Interior  Department  * 

Auditor  for  Navy  Department  * 

Auditor  for  Post  Office  Department  * 

Auditor  for  State  and  Other  Departments  * 
War  Department 

Secretary 

Assistant  Secretaries  ^ 
Bureau  of  Ordnance  and  Fortification 

Civilian  Member  * 
Mississippi  River  Commission 

Members 
Insular  Possessions 

Governor  of  Porto  Rico 

Attorney-General  of  Porto  Rico 

Commissioner  of  Education  of  Porto  Rico 

Governor  General  of  Philippine  Islands 

Vice  Governor  of  the  Philippine  Islands 
California  Debris  Commission 

Members  ° 
Department  of  Justice 

Attorney-General 

Assistant  to  the  Attorney-General 

Solicitor-General 

Assistant  Attorneys-General 

District  Attorneys 

Marshals 
Post  Office  Department 

Postmaster  General 

Assistant  Postmasters  General 

Purchasing  Agent 

First  Class  Postmasters 

Second  Class  Postmasters 

Third  Class  Postmasters 
Navy  Department 

Secretary 

Assistant  Secretary 

Governor  of  the  Virgin  Islands 

^  Abolished  by  Budget  and  Accounting  Act  of  June  10,  1921 ;  duties  are 
performed  by  the  Comptroller  General. 

'  Changed  to  Comptroller,  Bureau  of  Accounts,  and  placed  under  Post 
Office  Department  by  Budget  and  Accounting  Act  of  June  10,  1921. 

^  Only  one  Assistant  Secretary  at  present. 

*  Abolished  since  June  30,  1919. 

''Otficers  of  Engineer  Corps  of  the  Army. 


36  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Department  of  the  Interior 
Secretary 

Assistant  Secretaries 
Solicitor 
Patent  Office 
Commissioner 
Assistant  Commissioners 
Examiners  in  Chief 
Office  of  Indian  Affairs 
Commissioner 
Assistant  Commissioner 
General  Land  Office 
Commissioner 
Assistant  Commissioner 
Recorder 

Surveyors  General 
Registers 
Receivers 
Pension  Office 
Commissioner 
Deputy  Commissioner 
Geological  Survey 

Director 
Bureau  of  Mines 

Director 
Bureau  of  Education 

Commissioner 
Government  of  Territories 
Governor  of  Alaska 
Governor  of  Hawaii 
Secretary  of  Hawaii 
Department  of  Agriculture 
Secretary 

Assistant  Secretary 
Weather  Bureau 
Chief 
Department  of  Commerce 
Secretary 
Solicitor 

Assistant  Solicitor 
Bureau  of  the  Census 
Director  ■ 

Assistant  Director^ 
Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey 
Commissioned  Officers 
Superintendent 

'■  For  decennial  census  period  only. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         37 

Department  of  Commerce — Continued 
Steamboat-Inspection  Service 

Supervising  Inspector  General 

Supervising  Inspectors 
Bureau  of  Fisheries 

Commissioner 

Deputy  Commissioner 
Bureau  of  Navigation 

Commissioner 
Bureau  of  Standards 

Director 
Bureau  of  Foreign  and  Domestic  Commerce 

Director 

Assistant  Directors 
Department  of  Labor 

Secretary 

Solicitor 
Bureau  of  Immigration 

Commissioner-General 

Local  Commissioners 
Bureau  of  Naturalization 

Commissioner 
Bureau  of  Labor  Statistics 

Commissioner 
Children's  Bureau 

Chief 
Government  Printing  Office 

Public  Printer 
Interstate  Commerce  Commission 

Commissioners 

Chief  Inspector  of  Locomotive  Boilers 

Assistant  Chief  Inspector  of  Locomotive  Boilers 
Civil  Service  Commission 

Commissioners 

Chief  Examiner 
Federal  Reserve  Board 

Members 
Federal  Trade  Commission 

Commissioners 
United  States  Shipping  Board 

Commissioners 
Tariff  Commission 

Commissioners 
United  States  Employees'  Compensation  Commission 

Commissioners 
Federal  Board  for  Vocational  Education 

Commissioners 


i^JI1.S85 


38  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Board  of  Mediation  and  Conciliation* 
Commissioner 
Assistant  Commissioner 

Power  of  Congress  to  Control  the  Discretion  of  the  Presi- 
dent in  Respect  to  Appointments. — To  what  extent  may 
Congress  control  the  discretion  of  the  President  in  his  selection 
of  persons  for  nomination?  Is  his  discretion  absoKite,  or  may 
Congress  prescribe  rules  to  control  it — rules  providing,  for 
example,  for  examinations  or  for  open  competition? 

As  to  those  officers  whose  nomination  is  specifically  en- 
trusted to  the  President  by  the  Constitution — "ambassadors, 
other  public  ministers,  and  consuls''  and,  inferentially,  the 
"heads  of  departments" — it  seems  clear  that  Congress  has  no 
constitutional  power  to  control  the  action  of  the  President  in 
any  way.  As  to  other  presidential  appointments  it  is  arguable 
that  the  President's  power  exists  only  at  the  pleasure  of  Con- 
gress, which  could,  if  it  chose,  prescribe  appointment  by  one 
of  the  other  methods  permitted  by  the  Constitution;  and  that 
presidential  nomination  to  these  positions  is  as  much  subject 
to  the  control  of  Congress,  as  to  methods  of  selection,  as  is  a 
power  of  appointment  derived  wholly  from  statute. 

The  question  has  never  arisen  judicially  and  while  it  is  an 
interesting  one  for  the  constitutional  lawyer,  it  has  little  prac- 
tical importance.  Historically  the  President  has  always  taken 
the  lead  in  action  looking  to  the  establishment  of  some  sys- 
tem of  selection  of  appointees  whom  he  is  required  to  nomi- 
nate. It  is  not  likely  that  Congress  will  at  any  time  be  found 
forcing  upon  the  Executive  a  system  of  selection,  the  effect 
of  which  is  to  weaken  the  hold  of  the  political  machine  upon 
the  appointing  power.  Only  in  response  to  a  strong  and  in- 
sistent demand  from  the  President  will  Congress  give  either 
funds  or  statutory  recognition  to  any  proposal  that  a  ma- 
chinery and  procedure  of  selection  be  substituted  for  "sena- 
torial courtesy."  With  the  Executive  seeking  such  legislation, 
it  will  be  eflfcctive  even  if  only  permissive  in  its  terms. 

'  Has  ceased  to  function  owing  to  lack  of  appropriation,  but  lias  not 
been  formally  abolished. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         39 

In  practice  Congress  has  long  prescribed,  in  great  detail, 
the  method  to  be  followed  in  making  nominations  for  appoint- 
ment in  the  military  and  naval  services,  and  the  constitution- 
ality of  such  provisions  has  never  been  questioned.  In  the 
civil  service,  hoAvever,  Congress  has  to  date  in  only  two  cases 
those  of  the  commissioned  officers  of  the  Public  Health  Ser- 
vice and  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey — regulated,  by  law,  the 
selection  of  nominees  to  "presidential"  positions.  Aside  from 
these  the  President's  discretion  is  wholly  uncontrolled  by  law. 

The  Public  Health  Service  and  the  Coast  and  Geodetic 
Survey  are  in  many  respects  two  of  the  most  interesting  of  the 
civil  services  of  the  government  l^ecause  of  the  similarity  of 
their  system  of  rank  and  pay  to  that  of  the  military  and  naval 
services.  In  the  organization  of  these  services  Congress,  fol- 
lowing the  analogy  of  the  military  and  naval  services,  requires 
that  every  commissioned  officer  shall  be  appointed  by  the 
President  with  the  consent  of  the  Senate.  In  no  other  branch 
of  the  civil  service  of  the  government  is  there  a  similar  pro- 
vision. Conjointly  with  this  unique  method  of  appointment, 
however.  Congress  has  provided  ^  that  no  person  shall  be 
appointed  as  a  medical  officer  of  the  Public  Health  Service 
"until  after  passing  a  satisfactory  examination  in  the  several 
branches  of  medicine,  surgery,  and  hygiene  before  a  board  of 
medical  officers  of  the  said  service."  In  the  case  of  the  Coast 
and  Geodetic  Survey  "  the  law  provides  that  "no  person  shall 
be  appointed  aid  .  .  .  until  after  passing  a  satisfactory  mental 
and  physical  examination  conducted  in  accordance  with  regu- 
lations prescribed  by  the  Secretary  of  Commerce.^ 

^  Act  of  January  4,  1889,  25  Stat.  635. 

'40  Stat.  88. 

^  The  law  thus  regulating  the  methods  of  selection  to  be  applied  to  the 
Public  Health  Service  is  of  peculiar  interest  because  the  act  provides  also 
"that  original  appointments  in  the  service  shall  only  be  made  to  the  rank 
of  assistant  surgeon,"  thus  establishing  the  service  on  a  completely  closed 
basis  in  the  same  way  that  the  military  and  naval  services  are  organized. 
The  act  governing  appointments  in  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  does 
not  explicitly  say  that  original  appointment  shall  be  to  the  lowest  grade, 
but  it  accomplishes  this  by  implication  by  providing  that  "no  person  .  .  . 
shall  be  promoted  from  aid  to  junior  hydrographic  and  geodetic  engineer" 
or  to  the  next  higher  grade  without  passing  a  mental  and  physical  exam- 
ination conducted  in  accordance  with  regulations  to  be  prescribed  by  the 
Secretary  of  Commerce. 


40  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

These  statutes  do  not  provide  for  an  open  competitive  ex- 
amination for  entrance  to  the  service.  It  leaves  with  the 
President  complete  power  to  select  whom  he  will  for  nomina- 
tion to  the  Senate  subject  only  to  the  requirement  that  the 
persons  so  nominated  shall  first  pass  an  examination.  What 
is  provided  is,  therefore,  a  "non-competitive"  or  "pass'  exam- 
ination." The  unquestioning  acceptance  of  this  system  by 
the  Executive  does  not  prove  that  it  would  be  equally  valid 
constitutionally  for  Congress  to  prescribe  for  presidential 
positions  a  system  of  open  competitive  examination  with  com- 
pulsory nomination  of  those  graded  highest. 

Whatever  may  be  the  power  of  Congress  to  regulate  the 
method  by  which  nominees  to  the  Senate  are  selected  by  the 
President,  the  plenary  right  of  the  President  himself  to  pre- 
scribe any  formal  system  of  selection  he  may  desire  cannot 
be  questioned.  In  fact,  up  to  the  present  time,  he  has  estab- 
lished both  a  system  of  non-competitive  examination — that  for 
consuls  and  for  the  lower  officers  of  the  diplomatic  service — 
and  an  open  competitive  system — that  for  filling  certain  classes 
of  vacancies  in  presidential  postmasterships.  Both  of  these 
systems  of  selection  will  be  discussed  in  later  chapters. 
Non-Presidential  Positions. — Passing  now  to  the  non- 
presidential  positions,  embracing  the  remainder  of  the  execu- 
tive civil  service,  we  shall  consider  first  the  legal  provisions 
regarding  selection  and  then  those  regarding  tenure  and  re- 
moval, though  both  are  in  some  cases  contained  in  the  same  act. 

Since  power  of  appointment  vested  in  an  agency  other  than 
the  President  and  Senate  is  derived  wholly  from  statute,  the 
authority  of  Congress  to  prescribe  the  method  of  selection  to 
be  employed  in  the  exercise  of  that  power  is  complete.  This 
is  as  true  of  those  positions  whose  incumbents  are  regarded 
as  "officers"  as  of  those  filled  by  "employees"  or  "agents." 
In  theory  a  distinction  indeed  might  be  drawn ;  since  as  to 
"officers"  Congress  is  not  empowered  by  the  Constitution  to 
create  the  appointing  power  but  merely  to  select  one  of  the 
three  possible  classes  of  appointing  officers — the  President, 
the  courts  of  law,  and  the  heads  of  departments — named  by 


THE  LAW  OF  SRLECTION  AND  TENURE         41 

the  Constitution.  In  practice,  this  distinction  has  Ijcen  neg- 
lected; and  for  all  non-presidential  positions,  comprising  vir- 
tually the  whole  of  the  technical,  the  clerical,  and  the  me- 
chanical and  labor  forces  of  the  government,  Congress  has 
complete  control  over  the  machinery  of  selection.^ 

Not  until  1853,  however,  did  Congress  make  any  use 
whatever  of  this  plenary  control  over  methods  of  selection 
for  non-presidential  positions;  and  not  until  1883,  thirty  years 
later,  did  it  make  any  really  effective  use  of  it.  The  nature 
of  its  action  during  that  period,  and  subsequently,  will  now 
be  reviewed. 

Early  Legislation  Regarding  Methods  of  Selection. — In 
1853  and  1855  Congress  followed  the  example  of  England 
by  requiring  that  the  clerks  in  the  departments  at  Wash- 
ington should  pass  examinations  prior  to  appointment  in 
the  service.  The  act,  as  incorporated  in  the  Revised 
Statutes,  reads  as  follows: 

Sec.  163.  The  clerks  in  the  Departments  shall  be  arranged 
in  four  classes,  distinguished  as  the  first,  second,  third,  and 
fourth  classes. 

Sec.  164.  No  clerk  shall  be  appointed  in  any  Department 
in  either  of  the  four  classes  above  designated,  until  he  has 
been  examined  and  found  qualified  by  a  board  of  three  exam- 
iners, to  consist  of  the  chief  of  the  Bureau  or  office  into  which 
such  clerk  is  to  be  appointed  and  two  other  clerks  to  be  se- 
lected by  the  head  of  the  Department. 

This  law  was  extensively  applied  for  some  years,  but  its 
enforcement  gradually  weakened.  The  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion in  its  first  report  commented  on  the  system  developed 
under  this  law,  as  follows : 

The  essential  vices  of  the  pass-examination  system  were 
these : 

I.  The  examinations  were  not  open  to  all  persons  appar- 
ently qualified,  nor  even  to  all  such  persons  belonging  to  the 

^  "The  head  of  a  department  has  no  constitutional  prerogative  of 
appointment  to  offices  independently  of  the  legislation  of  Congress,  and  by 
such  legislation  he  must  be  governed,  not  only  in  making  appointments, 
but  in  all  that  is  incident  thereto."  (U.  S.  v.  Perkins,  January  2=;,  1886.  116 
U.  S.  483.) 


42  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

dominant  party,  but  rather  to  such  of  the  favorites  of  the 
dominant  faction  of  that  party  as  members  of  Congress  and 
great  pohticians  recommended. 

Though  the  more  disinterested  and  patriotic  of  those  who 
monopoHzed  patronage  brought  large  numbers  into  the  serv- 
ice who  were  both  capable  and  worthy,  the  tendency  was 
strong  in  favor  of  the  office-begging  and  office-earning  classes. 

2.  The  tenure  of  the  members  of  the  examining  boards 
.  was  too  precarious  for  strong  resistance  to  influence  and  solici- 
tation, but  it  should  be  said  to  their  credit  that  they  sometimes 
defeated  the  great  officers  and  politicians  who  tried  to  push 
their  favorites  past  the  examinations. 

3.  These  pass  examinations  denied  the  Government  a 
choice  from  among  the  most  meritorious  applicants.  There 
was  no  competition  or  comparison  of  merits  between  them, 
but  only  the  chance  of  taking  a  person  examined  separately, 
on  peril  of  offending  his  backers  by  refusing  him. 

In  1856  Congress  also  provided  that: 

the  President  is  authorized  ...  to  provide  for  the  appoint- 
ment of  vice-consuls,  vice-commercial  agents,  deputy  consuls, 
and  consular  agents  in  such  manner  and  under  such  regula- 
tions as  he  shall  deem  proper.  .  .  .  No  vice-consul,  vice- 
commercial  agent,  deputy  consul,  or  consular  agent  shall  be 
appointed  otherwise  than  under  such  regulations  as  have  been 
or  may  be  prescribed  by  the  President.^ 

This  statute  is  noteworthy  because  it  is  the  first  in  the  whole 
history  of  legislation  on  this  subject  in  which  the  power  is 
given  to  the  President  to  prescribe  regulations  for  selection. 
No  formal  system  of  selection,  however,  was  set  up  by  the 
President  under  the  authority  thus  conferred. 

Perhaps  the  only  other  provision  regarding  methods  of 
selection  applicable  to  particular  classes  of  personnel  was  that 
enacted  in  1871  relative  to  the  method  of  selection  of  local 
inspectors  of  hulls  and  of  boilers  in  the  Steamboat  Inspection 
Service.     This  statute  provided  that : 

Whenever  any  vacancy  occurs  in  any  local  board  of  in- 
spectors, or  whenever  local  inspectors  are  to  be  appointed  for 

'Act  of  August  18,  1856,  II  Stat.  57.  Incorporated  in  Revised  Stat- 
utes, Sec.  1695. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         43 

a  new  district,  the  supervising  inspectors  shall  notify  the  col- 
lector or  other  chief  officers  of  the  customs  for  the  district, 
and  the  judge  of  the  district  court  for  the  district  in  which  such 
appointment  is  to  be  made,  who,  together  with  the  supervising 
inspector,  shall  meet  together  as  a  board  of  designators,  and 
fill  the  vacant  or  new  inspectorship.  Such  board,  or  the  major 
part  thereof,  when  designating  an  inspector  of  hulls,  shall  se- 
lect a  person  of  good  character  and  suitable  qualifications  and 
attainments  to  perform  the  services  required  of  inspectors  of 
hulls,  and  who,  from  his  practical  knowledge  of  ship-building 
and  navigation  and  the  uses  of  steam  in  navigation,  is  fully 
competent  to  make  a  reliable  estimate  of  the  strength,  sea- 
worthiness, and  other  qualities  of  the  hulls  of  steam-vessels 
and  their  equipment,  deemed  essential  to  safety  of  life  in  their 
navigation ;  and  when  designating  an  inspector  of  boilers,  shall 
select  a  person  of  good  character  and  suitable  qualifications  and 
attainments  to  perform  the  services  required  of  inspectors  of 
boilers,  who,  from  his  knowledge  and  experience  of  the  duties 
of  an  engineer  employed  in  navigating  vessels  by  steam,  and 
also  of  the  construction  and  use  of  boilers,  and  machinery, 
and  appurtenances  therewith  connected,  is  able  to  form 
a  reliable  opinion  of  the  strength,  form,  workmanship,  and 
suitableness  of  boilers  and  machinery  to  be  employed  without 
hazard  to  life,  from  imperfection  in  the  materials,  workman- 
ship, or  arrangement  of  any  part  of  such  apparatus  for  steam- 
ing. 1 

It  will  be  seen  that  these  provisions  do  not  provide  for  any 
system  of  selection  but  merely  lay  an  injunction  upon  the  au- 
thorities charged  with  selection.  This  was  followed  in  1872 
by  an  act  providing  that  laborers  "shall  be  employed  in  the 
several  navy  yards  by  the  proper  officers  in  charge  with  ref- 
erence to  skill  and  efficiency  and  without  regard  to  other  con- 
siderations," ^  which,  of  course,  falls  in  the  same  class  as 
being  hortatory  rather  than  restrictive. 

The  Law  of  1871. — Not  until  1871  did  Congress  make  any 
comprehensive  attempt  to  exercise  control  over  the  selection 

'Act  of  February  28,  1871,  16  Stat.  443.  Incorporated  in  Sec.  4415, 
Revised  Statutes.  This  whole  section  has  been  amended  by  vesting  the 
power  of  selection  in  the  Secretary  of  Commerce. 

*Act  of  May  23,  1872,  17  Stat.  146.  Incorporated  in  Sec.  1544,  Revised 
Statutes. 


44  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

of  the  civil  personnel.  In  that  year,  as  the  result  of  persistent 
agitation  for  civil  service  reform  by  a  few  devoted  men  in 
Congress,  supported  by  President  Grant,  Congress  in  1871  en- 
acted the  first  law  establishing  a  general  system  of  selection. 
This  authorized  the  President 

to  prescribe  such  regulations  for  the  admission  of  persons  into 
the  civil  service  of  the  United  States  as  may  best  promote  the 
efficiency  thereof,  and  ascertain  the  fitness  of  each  candidate  in 
respect  to  age,  health,  character,  knowledge,  and  ability  for 
the  branch  of  the  service  into  which  he  seeks  to  enter ;  and  for 
this  purpose  he  may  employ  suitable  persons  to  conduct  such 
inquiries,  and  may  prescribe  their  duties,  and  establish  regula- 
tions for  the  conduct  of  persons  who  may  receive  appoint- 
ments in  the  civil  service.^ 

The  act  thus  in  terms  applies  to  all  positions  in  the  civil  service 
including  those  to  which  appointment  is  by  the  President  with 
the  consent  of  the  Senate;  but  since  the  President,  without 
statutory  authority,  has  complete  power  over  the  methods  of 
selection  for  such  positions,  the  act  may  be  regarded  as  ma- 
terial only  with  respect  to  non-presidential  positions. 

Wide  as  was  the  blanket  authority  conferred  by  the  act, 
it  lacked  the  reenforcement  of  adequate  funds  and  the  moral 
support  of  Congress,  and,  therefore,  proved  ineffectual ;  all 
effort  further  to  employ  it  was  abandoned  by  President  Grant 
in  1873.  Nevertheless,  it  is  far  more  sweeping  in  respect  to 
the  authority  conferred  upon  the  President  than  is  the  civil 
service  law  of  1883;  and,  as  will  shortly  appear,  it  remains  to 
this  day  a  most  useful  and  vital  part  of  the  federal  personnel 
law. 

The  Civil  Service  Act  of  1883. — The  failure  of  the  experi- 
ment of  1 87 1  led  to  the  enactment  in  1883  of  what  was  re- 
garded as  a  more  effective  measure."  This  act,  known  as  the 
civil  service  act  and  unamended  to  this  day,  constitutes  the 
legal  basis  on  which  the  present  machinery  for  the  selection  of 
the  personnel  for  the  non-presidential  positions  (other  than 
laborers)  chiefly  rests. 

*Act  of  March  3,  1871,  16  Stat.  514;  Revised  Statutes,  Sec.  1753. 
"Act  of  January  16,  1883,  22  Stat.  403. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         45 

The  substantive  provisions  of  this  act  fall  into  two  dis- 
tinct groups:  (i)  those  aimed  at  political  contributions  by 
employees  and  the  coercion  of  employees  for  political  pur- 
poses; and  (2)  those  relating  to  the  method  of  selection  of 
employees  for  appointment  and  promotion.  The  first  group 
has  no  direct  bearing  on  the  immediate  subject  and  need  not  be 
further  considered  at  this  point.  Reference  is  almost  invari- 
ably to  the  second  group  when  the  civil  service  law  is  men- 
tioned; but,  because  of  the  presence  of  the  other  group  of 
provisions  in  the  act,  it  is  necessary  for  precision  to  speak  not 
of  the  act  itself  but  of  the  provisions  of  the  act  relating  to 
selection.  The  precise  terms  of  those  provisions  are  set  forth 
in  due  course  in  this  section.  Broadly  speaking,  they  aim 
chiefly  at  establishing  a  system  under  which  the  classes  of 
employees  to  whom  the  provisions  apply  will_be_S£lected  by  open 
competitive  examination. 

The  provisions  of  the  act  relating  to  methods  of  selection 
are  an  extreme  example  of  "inartificial"  draftsmanship;  and 
an  exact  understanding  of  their  tenor  can  be  gained  only  from 
a  close  and  careful  study  of  the  act  itself.  Their  effect,  per- 
haps, may  be  most  clearly  stated  here  by  comparing  them  with 
the  act  of  1871,  above  set  forth. 

The  primary  difference  between  the  act  of  1871  and  that 
of  1883  is  in  respect  to  the  classes  of  employees  affected.  The 
act  of  1 87 1  applies  to  "the  civil  service  of  the  United  States." 
This  inclusive  term  would  seem  on  its  face  to  embrace  even 
the  officers  and  employees  of  Congress,  and  the  clerks  of  the 
United  States  courts,  who  are  commonly  regarded  as  em- 
ployees of  the  judicial  department.  However  this  may  be, 
and  that  phase  of  the  question  is  at  best  academic,  the  term 
certainly  extends  to  all  officers  and  employees  in  the  executive 
branch  of  the  government  without  exception. 

The  provisions  of  the  civil  service  act  relating  to  selection 
on  the  other  hand,  in  addition  to  explicitly  excluding  "any 
officer  not  in  the  executive  branch  of  the  government"  exclude 
from  their  operation :  first,  "any  person  employed  merely  as 
a  laborer  or  workman" ;  and  second,  "any  person  who  has 


46  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

been  nominated  for  confirmation  by  the  Senate."  ^  The  lat- 
ter class  may  indeed  be  brought  under  the  operation  of  the 
law  "by  direction  of  the  Senate" ;  but  the  failure  of  the  Sen- 
ate to  give  such  direction  in  a  single  instance  during  the  thirty- 
seven  years  of  the  act's  history  has  rendered  this  proviso  vir- 
tually obsolete. 

While  tJie  provisions  of  the  civil  service  law  relating  to 
the  methods  of  selection  thus  embrace,  potentially,  all  persons 
in  the  executive  civil  service  other  than  "presidential"  ap- 
pointees and  laborers,  these  provisions  do  not  apply  in  terms 
to  all  the  employees  within  its  scope,  but  only  to  such  as  are 
"classified"  under  the  act.  The  principle  of  "open,  competi- 
tive examinations  for  testing  the  fitness  of  applicants"  (Sec. 
2,  Second,  First)  is  to  be  applied  only  to  applicants  "for  the 
public  service  now  classified  or  to  be  classified  hereunder." 
Similarly,  the  principle  of  "selection  according  to  grade  from 
among  those  graded  highest"  is  to  be  applied  only  to  "the  of- 
fices, places,  and  employments  so  arranged  or  to  be  arranged 
in  classes."  (Section  2,  Second,  Second.)  Finally,  the  defi- 
nite prohibition  in  the  act  against  appointment  (or  promotion) 
without  either  examination  or  specific  exemption  from  exam- 
ination (Sec.  7)  applies  only  to  "either  of  the  said  classes  now 
existing,  or  that  may  be  arranged  hereunder  pursuant  to  said 
rules."  From  these  provisions  it  thus  seems  clear  that  it  was 
the  intention  of  the  framers  of  the  act  that  the  principles  of 
competition  and  examination  declared  by  the  act  should  be 
applied  only  to  such  positions  as  may  be  "classified,"  that  is, 
"arranged  in  classes." 

The  motive  for  thus  uniting  these  two  totally  distinct  pro- 
cedures is  difficult  to  understand.  It  is  perfectly  possible  to 
arrange  positions  in  classes  without  subjecting  them  to  com- 
petitive examination.  Similarly  it  is  equally  possible  to  apply 
the  method  of  competitive  selection  to  positions  not  classified, 

*  It  might  seem  that  this  language  applies  only  to  persons  who,  at  the 
time  of  the  passage  of  the  act,  held  positions  to  which  they  had  heen 
appointed  after  confirmation  l^y  the  Senate.  Hut  the  uniform  interpreta- 
tion of  the  clause  has  been  to  exclude  from  the  operation  of  the  act  all 
positions  to  which  appointment  is  made  upon  the  advice  and  consent  of 
the  Senate. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         47 

and  indeed  to  special  positions  not  readily  susceptible  of  ar- 
rangement in  classes.  In  actual  operation  the  broadest  pos- 
sible connotation  has  been  given  to  the  term  "classified,"  and 
as  a  result  it  has  been  customary  for  years  to  include  positions 
within  the  scope  of  the  competitive  system  even  though  they 
may  not  be  technically  "arranged  in  classes."  In  fact,  a  large 
proportion  of  the  positions  so  embraced  have  never  been  "ar- 
ranged in  classes"  at  all;  so  that  the  term  "classified"  has  come 
to  mean,  in  the  parlance  of  the  federal  personnel  system,  not 
"arranged  in  classes"  at  all,  but  simply  brought  within  the 
scope  of  the  competitive  examination  system,^  or,  more  cor- 
rectly, within  the  operation  of  the  civil  service  rules  regarding 
selection. 

The  provisions  made  in  the  act  for  "classification"  are 
equally  confused  and  ill-considered.  At  the  time  of  the  pas- 
sage of  the  act  but  one  portion  of  the  public  service  was  "now 
classified."  This  embraced  the  clerical  positions  in  the  execu- 
tive departments  at  Washington  to  which  a  compensation  of 
either  $1,200,  $1,400,  $1,600,  or  $1,800  attached.  By  an  act 
of  1853,  already  referred  to,  these  positions  had  been  arranged 
in  four  "classes"  corresponding  to  the  several  salary  rates  men- 
tioned. In  addition,  the  civil  service  act  (Sec.  6)  now  re- 
quired the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  and  the  Postmaster  Gen- 
eral, respectively,  to  "arrange  in  classes,"  in  conformity  as 
nearly  as  possible  to  the  statutory  classification  of  the  depart- 
mental clerks  just  referred  to,  "the  several  clerks  and  persons 
employed  by  the  collector,  naval  ofBcer,  surveyor,  and  ap- 
praisers, or  either  of  them,  or  being  in  the  public  service,  at 
their  respective  offices  in  each  customs  district  where  the  whole 

*At  ohe  point  the  civil  service  law  itself  seems  to  contemplate  just 
such  a  meaning  of  the  term  "classified."  The  concluding  sentence  of  Sec- 
tion 6  of  the  act  authorizes  the  heads  of  departments  from  time  to  time 
to  "revise  any  then  existing  classification  or  arrangement"  and  "for  the 
purposes  of  the  examination  herein  provided  for"  to  include  in  such  classi- 
fication employees  "not  before  classified  for  examination."  This  is,  how- 
ever, the  only  place  in  the  act  at  which  the  term  "classification"  is  used  as 
identical  with  the  designation  of  a  position  as  one  to  be  filled  by  examina- 
tion ;  and  indeed  in  the  next  section  the  two  things  are  apparently  regarded 
as  quite  distinct,  it  being  provided  that  no  person  who  has  been  nominated 
for  confirmation  by  the  Senate  shall  be  required  "to  be  classified  or  to  pass 
an  examination." 


48  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

number  of  said  clerks  and  persons  shall  be  altogether  as  many 
as  fifty";  and  "the  several  clerks  and  persons  employed,  or  in 
the  public  service,  at  each  post  office,  or  under  any  postmaster 
of  the  United  States,  where  the  whole  number  of  said  clerks 
and  persons  shall  together  amount  to  as  many  as  fifty." 
Finally,  the  act  provided,  that  from  time  to  time  each  depart- 
ment head,  and  each  "head  of  an  office''  (that  is,  of  an  inde- 
pendent establishment)  "shall,  on  the  direction  of  the  Presi- 
dent, and  for  facilitating  the  execution  of  this  act,  respectively 
revise  any  then  existing  classification  or  arrangement  of  those 
in  their  respective  departments  and  offices,  and  shall,  for  the 
purposes  of  the  examination  herein  provided  for,  include  in 
one  or  more  of  such  classes,  so  far  as  practicable,  subordinate 
places,  clerks,  and  officers  in  the  public  service  pertaining  to 
their  respective  departments  not  before  classified  for  exam- 
ination." 

It  is  in  this  last  provision  that  the  authority  for  extending 
the  competitive  system  beyond  the  narrow  limits  prescribed 
by  the  two  preceding  provisions  is  found;  and  it  is,  therefore, 
upon  this  provision  of  the  civil  service  law  and  upon  the  act 
of  1 87 1  that  the  application  of  the  system  to  far  the  greater 
proportion  of  the  employees  now  embraced  in  it  must  rest. 

Like  the  act  of  1871,  the  civil  service  act  itself  contains 
no  mandatory  prescription  of  methods  of  selection  to  be  em- 
ployed; like  the  act  of  1871,  it  leaves  complete  discretion  in 
this  respect  in  the  hands  of  the  President,  who  is  empowered 
to  promulgate  "rules  for  carrying  this  act  into  effect."  But 
unlike  the  act  of  1871,  it  sets  forth  in  general  terms  certain 
"fundamental  provisions"  which  such  rules  shall  contain.  As 
even  these  provisions  are  to  be  embodied  in  the  rules,  how- 
ever, only  "as  nearly  as  the  conditions  of  good  administra- 
tion will  warrant"  and  as  the  rules  are  in  no  wise  limited  to 
these  provisions,^  it  is  hardly  too  much  to  say  that  the  nature 
of  the  power  of  regulation  conferred  on  the  President  by  the 
civil  service  act  is  virtually  as  unqualified  as  is  that  conferred 

*  The  act  states  that  the  provisions  mentioned  shall  be  declared  "among 
other  things." 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         49 

by  the  act  of  1871.  This  is,  however,  a  somewhat  legahstic 
view.  The  moral  obHgation  imposed  on  the  President  actually 
to  apply  the  "fundamental  provisions"  wherever  practicable 
is,  of  course,  most  weighty.  Nevertheless,  it  must  be  clearly 
kept  in  mind  that  the  civil  service  law  requires  no  single  speci- 
fied position  to  be  filled  by  competitive  examination,  or  indeed 
even  by  non-competitive  examination.  Of  themselves,  there- 
fore, the  substantive  provisions  of  the  civil  service  law  relating 
to  selection  are  without  efifect.  So  far  as  they  have  vitality, 
they  draw  it  from  the  provisions  of  the  civil  service  rules  pro- 
mulgated by  the  President.  Hence  it  is  in  conjunction  with 
those  rules  that  these  substantive  provisions  can  best  be  ex- 
amined. 

Finally,  it  will  be  recalled  that  the  act  of  1871  authorized 
the  President  to  "employ  suitable  persons  to  conduct"  the  in- 
quiries regarding  the  fitness  of  candidates  authorized  by  the 
act;  and  to  prescribe  the  duties  of  such  persons.  The  civil 
service  act  on  the  other  hand  expressly  provides  for  a  com- 
mission of  three  members,  "not  more  than  two  of  whom  shall 
be  members  of  the  same  political  party,"  and  who  "should 
hold  no  other  official  place  under  the  United  States."  It  is 
also  provided  that  the  commission  may  at  places  where  ex- 
aminations are  to  take  place  "designate  and  select  a  suitable 
number  of  persons,  not  less  than  three,  in  the  official  service 
of  the  United  States  ...  to  be  members  of  boards  of  ex- 
aminers." The  duties  of  the  commission,  moreover,  are  de- 
tailed with  much  greater  fullness  than  was  attempted  in  the 
act  of  1871.  It  is  to  "aid  the  President  as  he  may  request  in 
preparing"  the  rules  already  referred  to,  and  "subject  to  the 
rules  that  may  be  made  by  the  President,"  it  is  to  "make  regu- 
lations for  and  have  control  of,"  the  examinations  which  may 
be  provided  for  by  the  rules,  and  "shall  supervise  and  pre- 
serve the  records  of  the  same."  It  may,  moreover,  investi- 
gate and  report  "upon  all  matters  touching  the  enforcement 
and  eflfects  of  said  rules  and  regulations."  Finally,  the  author- 
ity of  the  commission  is  strengthened  by  a  provision  requiring 
officers  to  give  it  the  use  of  public  buildings  for  holding  ex- 


50  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

aniinations,  and  by  a  provision  making  unlawful  any  fraud 
or  corruption  with  intent  to  defeat  the  purpose  of  the  act. 

Although  the  civil  service  act  has  never  teen  amended,  sev- 
eral supplemental  statutes  have  been  enacted.  None  of  them 
is  of  major  significance  except  those  exempting  certain  groups 
of  employees  from  the  operation  of  the  act,  which  are  review^ed 
in  a  subsequent  section  of  this  chapter.  They  bear  only  on 
details  of  the  operation  of  the  system  of  competitive  selection 
and  will  be  mentioned  in  connection  with  the  detailed  account 
of  that  system  in  a  subsec(uent  ch  ipter. 

Both  Presidential  and  labor  positions,  and  indeed  those 
excluded  from  the  operation  of  the  civil  service  law  by  spe- 
cial statute  (to  which  attention  will  be  called  in  a  subsequent 
section  of  the  present  chapter),  as  has  been  pointed  out,  are 
subject,  by  the  act  of  1871,  to  any  system  of  selection,  in- 
cluding examination,  which  the  President  may  order.  The 
elimination  of  these  classes  of  personnel  from  the  operation 
of  the  civil  service  law  may  be  thought  for  practical  purposes 
immaterial.  Such  is  not  the  case,  however.  Whatever  may 
be  the  President's  legal  power,  the  civil  service  law  does  what 
the  act  of  1871  does  not — it  specifically  imposes  upon  the 
President  the  moral  duty  of  applying  the  principle  of  "open 
competitive  examination"  and  "selection  according  to  grade 
from  among  those  graded  highest,"  as  far  as  the  conditions 
of  good  administration  will  warrant,  and  this  moral  mandate 
has  become  so  firmly  fixed  as  a  portion  of  the  political  tra- 
dition that  the  mere  inclusion  of  a  position  under  the  civil 
service  law,  despite  the  plenary  authority  granted  to  the  Presi- 
dent to  except  it  from  competition  as  wholly  as  though  it  did 
not  fall  under  that  law,  may  be  regarded  in  every  case  as  a  vic- 
tory for  the  merit  principle.  It  may  be  regarded,  therefore, 
as  unfortunate  for  the  development  of  the  merit  system  that 
the  civil  service  law  docs  not  a])ply  to  presidential  and  to  labor 
employees.  Although  the  legal  situation  would  not  be  changed 
in  any  substantial  respect  by  their  inclusion  at  the  present  time, 
an  amendment  to  secure  their  inclusion  should  have  the  ear- 
nest support  of  every  friend  of  the  merit  system. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         51 

Quite  aside  from  its  influence  on  the  spread  of  the  merit 
principle,  the  inckision  of  the  entire  service  under  one  statute 
would  simplify  administration,  as  will  subsequently  appear 
from  the  discussions  of  assignments  and  transfers  involving 
a  change  from  an  unclassified  to  a  classified  status.  This 
division  of  the  service  into  these  purely  statutory  classes  on 
a  basis  which  may,  and  in  some  cases  does,  have  no  relation 
to  the  method  of  selection  or  the  needs  of  the  personnel  ad- 
ministration, necessarily  places  an  additional  artificial  difficulty 
in  the  way  of  the  free  movement  of  personnel  within  the  serv- 
ice.^ 

The  civil  service  act  differs  from  most  of  the  acts  which 
have  followed  it  in  state  and  local  jurisdictions  in  one  point. 
It  vests  complete  discretion  in  the  application  of  the  competi- 
tive principle  of  selection  and  the  promulgation  of  rules  in 
the  President  himself.  The  Civil  Service  Commission  has  no 
powers  under  this  head  except  those  the  President  confers 
upon  it.  In  most  jurisdictions  it  has  been  thought  necessary 
or  desirable  to  give  the  Civil  Service  Commission  a  large  meas- 
ure, if  not  the  whole,  of  the  discretionary  power  created  by 
the  act,  the  theory  being  that  the  checking  of  the  discretion  of 

*  A  view  contrary  to  the  one  here  expressed  has  found  support  from 
some  who  have  had  much  experience  in  connection  with  the  administration 
of  the  federal  civil  service  law.  This  view  has  been  stated  as  follows  in  a 
letter  to  the  writer :  "While  there  might  be  some  advantages  in  the 
extension  of  the  civil  service  law  to  include  laborers,  the  result  of  such 
action  would  undoubtedly  prove  a  distinct  disadvantage  to  the  service 
rather  than  a  benefit.  At  the  present  time  a  barrier  is  set  up  which 
effectually  prevents  departments  from  assigning  a  mere  laborer  or  work- 
man to  a  classified  position  except  incidentally  upon  the  approval  of  the 
Commission.  One  evil  in  the  assignment  of  unclassified  laborers  to  classi- 
fied duty  arises  in  the  claim  for  promotion  to  classified  positions  by  reasons 
of  experience  and  capability  acquired  in  the  unclassified  position."  The 
validity  of  this  view  is  open  to  serious  question.  It  hardly  can  be  said 
correctly  that  the  present  distinction  between  unclassified  and  classified 
positions  erects  a  barrier  "which  efi^ectually  prevents  departments  from 
assigning  a  mere  laborer  or  a  workman  to  a  classified  position."  It  is  true 
that  the  rules  at  the  present  time  prohibit  such  an  assignment ;  but  they 
prevent  it  only  in  so  far  as  the  Commission  is  able  to  secure  or  enforce 
compliance  with  its  rules.  Even  though  the  distinction  between  unclassified 
and  classified  positions  were  abolished  and  the  grade  of  laborer  were 
merely  to  become,  as  indeed  it  is  in  a  great  many  local  jurisdictions,  a 
sub-class  of  the  geneial  classified  service,  it  would  still  be  open  to  the 
Commission  to  prohibit  the  assignment  of  a  mere  laborer  or  workman  to  a 
position  of  higher  duty  or  compensation ;  but  the  enforcement  of  such  rule 
would  depend  upon  the  resources  at  the  disposal  of  the  Commission. 


52  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

the  executive  was  the  primary  purpose  of  the  act,  and  that 
such  a  check  could  effectively  be  exercised  only  by  a  body 
largely  independent  of  the  executive.  The  federal  personnel 
system,  however,  is  so  vast  and  the  President  so  far  removed 
from  the  subordinate  personnel  that  a  far  greater  and  more 
rapid  development  of  restrictive  control  has  ensued  in  the 
federal  service  under  Presidential  authority  than  has  been  ob- 
tained in  small  jurisdictions  with  an  independent  civil  service 
commission.  The  completeness  of  the  power  vested  in  the 
President  has  resulted  here  and  there  in  a  less  thoroughgoing 
and  consistent  application  of  merit  principles  than  would  have 
been  likely  had  the  power  been  vested  in  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission itself,  even  though  that  body  remained  entirely  de- 
pendent on  the  President  in  respect  to  appointment  and  re- 
moval. Future  progress  should  probably  be  in  this  direction ; 
but  the  matter  should  be  considered  in  its  relation  to  the  gen- 
eral question  of  giving  membership  on  the  commission  a  more 
representative  character  and  a  more  attractive  status,  points 
discussed  in  a  subsequent  chapter. 

The  opposite  extreme  to  the  present  arrangement  would 
be  not  only  to  give  the  Civil  Service  Commission  all  the  dis- 
cretionary and  regulatory  power  now  possessed  by  the  Presi- 
dent, but  to  have  it  appointed  independently  of  him.  Such 
an  arrangement  would  represent  a  fundamental  departure  from 
the  tradition  of  the  national  government.  It  would  entail  a 
basic  division  of  responsibility  for  the  personnel  system,  and 
consequently  for  the  whole  administrative  system,  of  the  gov- 
ernment. It  is  not  believed  that  experience  or  present  con- 
ditions furnish  any  warrant  for  so  radical  a  change.^ 

The  civil  service  act  expressly  prohibits  the  appointment 
of  any  "officer  or  clerk  contrary  to  its  terms,"  yet  no  power 
is  vested  in  the  Civil  Service  Commission  itself  to  enforce  this 
requirement.     In  a  number  of  jurisdictions  the  civil  service 

*  Tlie  two  proposals  here  discussed  are  to  he  sharply  distinguished  from 
that  which  would  leave  the  President's  power  of  regulation  unimpaired,  hut 
would  make  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  in  its  administration  of  the 
law  and  rules,  independent  of  the  President  (through  appointment  by  an 
independent  authority  such  as  the  Supreme  Court). 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         53 

law  provides  that  no  payment  shall  be  made  upon  any  payroll 
until  the  civil  service  commission  has  certified  that  all  per- 
sons whose  names  appear  thereon  have  been  appointed  in  pur- 
suance of  law.  In  the  absence  of  any  provision  of  this  char- 
acter in  the  federal  civil  service  law,  the  Commission,  in  1897, 
requested  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  to  establish  a  system 
of  personnel  audit  in  the  office  of  the  Comptroller  of  the  Treas- 
ury.^ The  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  declined  to  do  this  and 
the  Commission  accordingly  sent  to  the  Comptroller  of  the 
Treasury  lists  of  the  names  of  persons  known  by  it  to  be 
holding  office  or  employment  in  violation  of  the  civil  service 
act.  The  Comptroller,  however,  declined  to  interfere,  and  on 
April  I,  1899,  rendered  an  opinion  addressed  to  a  United 
States  Marshal  who  admitted  that  he  had  appointed  an  office 
deputy  without  reference  to  the  lists  furnished  by  the  Civil 
Service  Commission,  even  though  the  position  of  office  deputy 
had  been  placed  by  the  President  in  the  classified  service  and 
the  civil  service  rules  promulgated  by  the  President  required 
that  persons  in  the  classified  service,  unless  specifically  ex- 
empted, should  be  appointed  from  lists  furnished  by  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  as  a  result  of  open  competitive  examina- 
tion. The  decision  of  the  Comptroller  ^  held,  to  quote  the 
syllabus,  that  "a  person  employed  .  .  .  without  having  been 
certified  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  is  eligible  to  employ- 
ment, although  employed  in  violation  of  law."  The  theory  ad- 
vanced is  that,  if  the  marshal  had  violated  an  executive  order 
and  no  action  had  been  taken  by  his  superior,  the  Attorney 

'Such  a  system,  if  established,  would  have  dififered  from  the  systems 
employed  in  local  jurisdictions  under  a  provision  of  the  type  just  cited, 
under  which  payment  is  withheld  until  the  certification  of  the  Civil  Service 
Commission  is  obtained.  It  is  not  the  practice  of  the  federal  government 
to  make  any  central  audit  of  vouchers  before  disbursing,  the  practice  being, 
on  the  contrary,  for  the  several  departmental  disbursing  officers  to  make 
all  disbursements,  including  payroll  disbursements,  upon  their  own  responsi- 
bility, being  held  liable  for  any  illegal  payments  which  may  be  subse- 
quently discovered  upon  examination  by  the  auditors  acting  under  the 
direction  of  the  Comptroller  of  the  Treasury.  The  request  of  the  Com- 
mission, had  it  been  granted,  would  have  involved  an  examination  of  all 
payrolls  by  the  auditors  to  ascertain  whether  any  person  appearing  on  such 
payrolls  held  his  position  in  violation  of  the  civil  service  law  or  rules. 

''Decisions  of  the  Comptroller  of  the  Treasury,  vol.  5   (1899),  p.  649. 


54  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

General,  and  similarly  no  action  had  been  taken  against  the 
Attorney  General  by  the  President,  the  action  of  the  marshal 
might  be  regarded  as  having  had  the  approval  of  the  President, 
and  the  President  as  having  impliedly  waived  the  provisions  of 
his  own  general  order  in  the  specific  case.  It  need  hardly  be 
said  that  this  decision  clearly  runs  counter  to  the  well-estab- 
lished doctrine  which  gives  to  executive  orders  made  in  pursu- 
ance of  law  the  force  of  law.  However,  taking  the  position  he 
did,  the  Comptroller  decided  that  he  "would  not  go  behind  the 
certificate  of  the  appointing  power  and  ascertain  whether  the 
civil  service  rules  and  regulations  have  been  complied  with  in 
the  employment  of  persons  in  the  classified  civil  service."  The 
Civil  Service  Commission  appears  to  have  made  no  further 
attempt  to  secure  action  in  this  direction  ^  and  the  Comp- 
troller's decision  represents  the  practice  down  to  this  day. 

Although  the  failure  to  confer  upon  the  Commission  any 
power  to  enforce  the  law  was  undoubtedly  a  serious  defect  in 
the  framing  of  the  act,  and  undoubtedly  prevented  as  rapid 
and  consistent  an  observance  of  the  law  in  its  early  days  as 
might  otherwise  have  been  had,  it  can  hardly  be  said  that  at 
the  present  time  this  absence  of  legal  power  is  material.  Since 
the  instance  above  cited  took  place,  a  tradition  has  developed 
throughout  the  service  which  insures  the  observance  of  the 
law  and  the  regulations  substantially  as  effectively  and,  of 
course,  infinitely  more  economically  than  would  be  secured  by 
an  elaborate  and  thoroughgoing  audit  of  payrolls  by  the  Civil 
Service  Commission.  It  is  not  believed  that  at  the  present 
time  the  letter  of  the  civil  service  rules  is  in  any  appreciable 
degree  willfully  violated. 

The  Civil  Service  Rules  and  Orders. — The  civil  service 
rules  now  in  force  were  promulgated  by  the  President  on 
April  15,  1903.     Since  then  they  have  been  amended  textually 

*  Indeed  the  Commission  not  only  made  no  attempt  to  secure  legislative 
relief  but  the  whole  subject  is  not  mentioned  in  its  annual  reports.  For 
the  statements  of  fact  aI)ove  made  reliance  has  been  placed  principally  on 
the  report  of  the  investigating  committee  of  the  National  Civil  Service 
Reform  League  on  the  Condition  of  the  Civil  Service  under  the  Present 
National  Administration,  made  to  the  annual  meeting  of  that  body  in  1900 
(See  Proceedings,  1900,  p.  2>3  ff-)- 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         55 

a  number  of  times.  In  addition,  their  tenor  on  several  points 
has  been  altered  by  executive  orders  issued  by  the  President. 

The  rules  recite  that  they  are  promulgated  by  the  Presi- 
dent '*in  the  exercise  of  power  conferred  by  the  Constitution, 
by  Section  1753,  Revised  Statutes  [hereinbefore  referred  to 
as  the  act  of  1871]  and  the  act  of  January  16,  1883  [the  civil 
service  law]."  The  act  of  187 1,  it  will  be  recalled,  author- 
ized the  President  not  merely  to  "prescribe  regulations  for  the 
admission  of  persons  into  the  civil  service  of  the  United 
States,"  but  to  "establish  regulations  for  the  conduct  of  per- 
sons who  may  receive  appointments  in  the  civil  .service." 
Again  the  civil  service  act,  as  already  pointed  out,  contains 
provisions  bearing  on  the  matter  of  political  contributions  by 
employees,  and  the  coercion  of  employees  for  political  pur- 
poses, and  confers  upon  the  President  the  blanket  power  to 
promulgate  "suitable  rules  for  carrying  this  act  into  effect." 

Finally  the  civil  service  act  itself,  while  it  enumerates  cer- 
tain specific  provisions  which  the  rules  shall  embody,  "so 
far  as  the  conditions  of  good  administration  warrant,"  it  per- 
mits the  President,  by  implication,  to  make  rules  on  any  other 
phase  of  personnel  administration.^ 

The  rules  consequently  contain  provisions  bearing  on  al- 
most all  phases  of  personnel  administration.  All  these  pro- 
visions will  be  adverted  to  in  their  proper  place.  Here  we 
are  concerned  only  with  those  rules  which  bear  directly  on 
the  matter  of  the  application  of  formal  systems  of  selection  to 
that  portion  of  the  service  to  which  the  civil  service  act  re- 
lates.^ 

*  The  act  provides  that  "among  other  things"  the  President  shall  pro- 
mulgate rules  as  set  forth  in  the  statute.  As  was  said  by  Attorney  General 
Knox  (23  Op.  Atty.  Gen.,  595,  597,  December  2,  1901)  :  "Short  of  a  pur- 
pose to  break  down  this  law  or  impose  some  arbitrary  and  unfair  require- 
ment which  is  inconsistent  with  the  spirit  of  law  in  general  (a  supposition 
too  absurd  to  be  indulged),  it  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  the  determina- 
tion of  the  contents  of  these  rules  rests  almost  wholly  with  the  President 
himself." 

*  Since  the  rules  as  already  indicated  also  cite  the  Constitution  and  the 
act  of  1871  as  sources  of  the  authority  of  the  President,  it  would  have  been 
perfectly  proper  for  the  President  to  incorporate  in  those  rules  the  various 
orders  setting  up  systems  of  selection  for  classes  of  personnel  not  within 
the  provisions  of  the  civil  service  act  relating  to  selection,  but  this  has  in 


56  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

The  "Classified"  Service. — It  will  be  recalled  that  the 
provisions  of  the  civil  service  act  relating  to  selection  apply 
only  to  positions  "classified"  under  the  act.  This  does  not 
mean  that  all  positions  "classified"  must  be  filled  by  open  com- 
petitive examination.  On  the  contrary,  the  provision  of  the 
act  which  lays  down  the  principle  of  open  competitive  exam- 
ination merely  provides  that  the  President  shall  promulgate 
a  rule  which  shall  "provide  and  declare  .  .  .  for  open  com- 
petitive examinations"  for  positions  "classified,"  "so  far  as 
the  conditions  of  good  administration  will  warrant."  The 
same  intention  is  manifested  in  the  enforcing  clause  of  the 
act  (Sec.  7)  which  prohibits  the  employment  of  any  person 
in  a  "classified"  position  "until  he  has  passed  an  examination, 
or  is  shown  to  be  specially  exempted  from  such  examination 
in  conformity  herewith."  Indeed  this  clause,  the  only  man- 
datory clause  in  the  entire  act  relating  to  selection,  does  not 
even  require  that  the  examination  passed  by  those  not  "spe- 
cially exempted"  shall  be  open  or  competitive.  It  is  thus  clear 
that  under  the  act  a  position  may  be  a  "classified"  one  and  yet 
need  not  be  filled  by  competitive  examination,  or  by  any  form 
of  examination. 

In  the  earlier  rules,  however,  the  process  of  "classifica- 
tion" was  conceived  of  as  synonymous  with  the  application 
of  the  principle  of  competitive  examination;  and  those  posi- 
tions to  which  this  method  was  not  applied  were  regarded  by 
the  rules  as  "not  yet  classified."  But  since  the  Revision  of 
1896,  the  rules  have  followed  the  original  intent  of  the  civil 
service  law  and  they  now  prescribe  (Rule  II)  that  "the  clas- 
sified service  shall  include  all  officers  and  employees  in  the 
executive  civil  service  of  the  United  States,  heretofore  or 
hereafter  appointed  or  employed,  in  positions  now  existing 
or  hereafter  to  be  created,  of  whatever  function  or  designa- 
tion, whether  compensated  by  a  fixed  salary  or  otherwise,  ex- 
cept persons  employed  merely  as  laborers,  and  persons  whose 

no  case  been  done.  So  far  as  methods  of  selection  are  concerned  the 
rules,  like  the  civil  service  act,  exclude  from  their  application  presiden- 
tial appointees  and  laborers. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         57 

appointments  are  subject  to  confirmation  by  the  Senate" — 
that  is,  all  officers  and  employees  to  whom  the  principles  of 
selection  declared  by  the  civil  service  act  may,  under  that  act, 
be  applied,^  the  rules  making  specific  designation  of  those 
positions  to  which  competitive  selection  is  not  to  be  applied.- 
Under  the  rules  now  in  force  all  "classified"  positions,  as 
thus  defined,  are  to  be  filled  by  open  competitive  examination 
unless  specifically  excepted  therefrom.  These  exceptions  take 
either  of  two  forms.  The  rules  themselves  make  provisions 
for  "non-competitive"  and  for  "excepted"  positions,  and  con- 
tain schedules  of  the  positions  included  under  each  head.  Ad- 
ditional exceptions,  usually  of  a  less  permanent  nature,  are 
created  by  special  executive  order,  without  textual  amend- 
ment of  the  rules  or  accompanying  schedules.  The  precise 
nature  and  extent  of  each  of  these  classes  of  exceptions  from 
competitive  selection  warrants  examination. 
Non-Competitive  Positions. — Non-competitive  appoint- 
ments are  provided  for  in  Rule  III,  Section  2,  which  reads : 
"Where  in  its  opinion  the  conditions  of  good  administration 
warrant,  the  commission  may  give  non-competitive  examina- 
tions to  test  fitness  for  .  .  .  appointment  to  the  positions 
named  in  Schedule  B  of  these  rules."  While  discretion  is 
thus  accorded  the  Commission  to  use  either  competitive  or 
non-competitive  examinations  for  these  positions,  it  has  fol- 

*  Indeed  this  definition  is  so  broadly  phrased  that  in  strictness  it  would 
incKide  even  those  positions  which  are  by  special  statute  specifically  ex- 
cluded from  the  operation  of  that  civil  service  law.  It  is  not  intended, 
of  course,  to  include  those  positions. 

'  The  "classified"  positions  to  which  competitive  selection  is  applied  are 
distinguished  in  the  rules  from  the  "classified"  positions  not  filled  by  com- 
petition by  the  term  "classified  competitive"  positions.  Since,  however, 
those  classified  positions  which  are  not  filled  by  competitive  examination 
are  not  clearly  distinguished  in  the  popular  mind  from  positions  not  classic 
fied,  there  is  a  natural  tendency  to  restrict  the  application  of  the  term 
"classified"  service,  as  it  was  restricted  in  the  earlier  rules,  to  (fompetitive 
positions,  even  though  the  rules,  when  referring  only  to  those  positions, 
speak  always  of  the  "classified  competitive  service."  So  general  has  this 
popular  usage  of  the  term  "classified  service"  become  that  it  has  now 
received  legal  recognition.  By  act  of  August  24,  1912  (37  Stat.  L.  555), 
Congress  provided  certain  safeguards  aeainst  improper  removal  from  the 
"classified  civil  service."  In  an  opinion  rendered  shortfy  after  (30  Op. 
Atty.-Gen.,  181),  the  Attorney  General  declared  that  the  term  "was  used 
in  the  more  popular  sense  of  the  competitive  service,  and  therefore  should 
not  be  held  to  include  excepted  positions," 


58  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

lowed  consistently  the  practice  of  using  non-competitive  ex- 
aminations only.  The  incumbents  of  these  positions  are  se- 
lected, therefore,  by  the  appointing  officer,  subject  only  to  their 
successfully  meeting  a  test  imposed  by  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission, which  the  rules  provide  "shall  consist  of  the  same 
tests  of  fitness  as  those  applied  to  other  persons  seeking  ap- 
pointment through  competitive  examination,"  a  requirement 
obviously  of  no  importance  since  competitive  examination  for 
these  positions  is  not  given. 

In  any  sound  system  of  personnel  administration  positions 
will  be  found  which  cannot  be  filled  to  the  best  advantage  by 
open  competition.  Designation  by  the  appointing  officer  of 
a  particular  individual  for  appointment  subject  to  the  passing 
of  a  particular  test  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  is  in  such 
cases  clearly  a  desirable  procedure. 

The  positions  now  filled  by  this  method,  under  the  exist- 
ing provisions  of  the  civil  service  rules,  are  not  numerous. 
Some  of  them  fall  clearly  within  the  particular  provinces  of 
a  non-competitive  method.  Thus,  it  is  provided  that  certain 
positions  in  the  Indian  service  ^  and  in  the  Office  of  Indian 
Affairs  -  may  be  filled  non-competitively  when  filled  by  In- 
dians; that  any  competitive  position  in  an  Indian  school  may 
be  filled  non-competitively  when  filled  by  the  wife  of  a  com- 
petitive employee  at  that  school  f  and  that  any  competitive 
position  at  a  United  States  penitentiary  may  be  so  filled  when 
filled  by  a  paroled  prisoner."* 

Again  there  are  found  certain  positions  so  undesirable 
either  by  reason  of  low  compensation  or  remote  location,  or 
of  such  infrequent  occurrence,  that  open  competitive  examina- 
tion would  be  futile.  The  service  in  these  cases  usually  con- 
siders itself   fortunate  if   it  can  find  a  suitable  employee  to 

*  Superintendent,  teacher,  manual  training  teacher,  'kindergartner,  phy- 
sician, matron,  clerk,  seamstress,  farmer,  and  industrial  teacher  (Schedule 
B,  II). 

*  Junior  clerk,  messenger,  assistant  messenger,  and  messenger  boy 
(Schedule  R,  I,  2). 

'  Schedule  B,  T,  3. 

*  The  j)risoner  must  be  recommended  for  such  employment  by  the 
officers  of  the  penitentiary  in  which  the  employment  is  proposed,  by  the 
Board  of  Parole,  and  by  the  Department  of  Justice  (Schedule  B,  V,  i). 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         59 

accept  the  position.  Here,  too,  is  obviously  a  proper  case 
for  the  use  of  the  non-competitive  method.  There  would  seem 
to  be  only  one  instance  ^  of  such  a  position  in  the  present 
schedule  of  non-competitive  positions,  since  such  positions  are 
usually  entirely  excepted  from  examination. 

Several  additional  classes  of  positions  are  found,  however, 
for  whose  inclusion  in  the  non-competitive  class  there  is  little 
apparent  reason,  since  in  virtually  every  case  positions  of  equal 
importance  and  difficulty  in  other  services  are  filled  by  open 
competition.  These  positions  are:  miners  employed  at  res- 
cue stations  or  on  rescue  cars  at  experimental  mines  under  the 
Bureau  of  Mines ;  -  special  agents  of  the  Division  of  Inquiry 
of  the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission;-''  assistant  engineers 
in  the  Valuation  Division  of  that  Commission;'*  and  various 
classes  of  employees  of  the  Department  of  Commerce  engaged 
in  investigating  trade  conditions  both  at  home  and  abroad.^ 

That  little,  if  any,  good  reason  exists  for  the  inclusion 
of  these  positions  in  the  non-competitive  class  would  seem  to 
be  indicated  by  the  proviso  attached  to  the  orders  including  the 
miners  in  the  Bureau  of  Mines  and  the  special  agents  of  the 
Interstate  Commerce  Commission  under  this  class  "that  should 
the  Civil  Service  Commission  at  any  time  have  reason  to  be- 
lieve that  the  privilege  so  afforded  is  abused  it  may  revoke 
it." 

The  existence  of  an  emergency  is  another  reason  which 
may  warrant  the  substitution  of  the  non-competitive  for  the 
competitive  procedure.  The  application  of  the  competitive 
method  necessarily  requires  an  appreciable  time.  Public  an- 
nouncement must  be  made,  usually  over  the  country  as  a  whole, 
and  a  reasonable  time  given  for  the  submission  of  applica- 
tions, and  even  if  no  written  test  is  embraced  in  the  exam- 

^  The  position  referred  to  is  that  of  discipHnarian  in  the  Indian  Schools 
(Schedule  B,  I.  7). 

'  Schedule  B,  1,4. 

'  Schedule  B,  II,  i. 

*  Schedule  B,  II,  2. 

'  Trade  commissioners,  commercial  agents,  experts,  and  special  agents 
(Schedule  B,  III,  2)  ;  and  clerks  to  commercial  attaches  (Schedule  B, 
III,  i). 


6o  THE  FEDERAL  SERMCE 

illation,  time  must  be  taken  for  the  conscientious  examination 
of  all  the  applications  submitted  and  their  comparative  grad- 
ing, involving  also  usually  the  necessity  for  correspondence 
with  persons  familiar  with  the  applicants.  Under  the  most 
favorable  circumstances  and  the  most  expeditious  procedure 
this  will  consume  not  less  than  perhaps  two  or  three  weeks, 
and  cases  arise  even  in  times  of  peace  where  so  long  a  delay 
is  highly  undesirable  or  even  impossible.  Consequently,  in 
response  to  war  needs  the  President,  on  March  25,  191 7,  or- 
dered that  "when  the  Civil  Service  Commission  decides  that, 
because  of  a  public  exigency,  there  is  need  of  the  immediate 
filling  of  a  position  for  which  there  is  no  suitable  eligible, 
the  Commission  may  authorize  the  filling  of  such  position  by 
the  appointment  of  a  person  shown  to  be  qualified  by  such  non- 
competitive test  of  fitness  as  the  Commission  may  prescribe,'' 
This  order  proved  of  the  highest  value  during  the  war,  A 
number  of  persons  appointed  under  it  are  still  in  the  service, 
having  received  permanent  appointment;  but  it  is,  of  course, 
purely  an  emergency  procedure,  to  be  resorted  to  only  when 
circumstances  make  it  unavoidable. 

It  is  difficult  to  ofTer  any  judgment  as  to  how  real  a  check 
upon  political  selection  the  conduct  of  non-competitive  ex- 
aminations by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  constitutes.  The 
Commission  does  not  publish  or  compile  any  figures  showing 
the  number  of  such  examinations  held,  the  number  of  entrants, 
and  the  number  of  persons  declared  qualified. 
Positions  Excepted  by  the  Rules  and  Orders. — The  ex- 
cepted class,  which  is  provided  for  in  Rule  II,  Section  3  of 
the  Rules  is  of  far  greater  importance.  That  rule  provides 
that  "appointments  to  the  excepted  positions  named  in  Sched- 
ule A  of  these  rules  may  be  made  without  examination  or  upon 
non-competitive  examination;  but  the  proper  appointing  offi- 
cer may  fill  an  excepted  position  as  competitive  positions  are 
filled."  While  this  rule  thus  admits  of  competitive  or  non- 
competitive examination  being  employed  in  the  filling  of  any 
of  the  positions  in  this  class,  they  are  in  practice  filled  entirely 
without  examination. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         6i 

A  large,  perhaps  the  largest,  class  of  positions  covered  by 
this  rule  consists  of  skilled  and  non-skilled  laborers  employed 
in  the  field  services.  The  theory  on  which  exception  from 
competition  may  be  justified  in  these  cases  is  that  when  work 
is  being  conducted  in  the  field  at  remote  points,  it  is  essential 
that  the  officer  in  charge  of  such  work  be  given  a  free  hand 
in  recruiting  whatever  skilled  labor  he  may  need  which  may 
be  locally  available,  without  the  necessity  of  calling  upon  vthe 
Civil  Service  Commission  for  the  certification  of  eligibles. 

Another  class  of  exceptions  are  those  which  are  made  on 
the  ground  of  the  positions  being  of  a  "confidential"  charac- 
ter. It  is  on  this  theory  that  the  various  private  secretaries 
to  heads  of  departments  and  bureaus  are  excepted  from  ex- 
amination; and  the  same  argument  has  been  advanced  in  sup- 
port of  the  exception,  for  example,  of  national  bank  exam- 
iners. 

Other  classes  consist  of  positions  where  the  service  required 
is  wholly  temporary  or  is  of  a  part-time  character,  and,  there- 
fore, necessarily  performed  by  persons  in  the  immediate  vi- 
cinity, or  in  which  the  work  carried  on  is  financed  not  chiefly 
by  the  government  but  by  private  organizations  or  persons, 
or  in  which  the  work  is  carried  on  in  such  unusual  locations 
that  competition  would  be  impracticable,  or  where  the  salary 
ofifered  is  so  low  that  no  competition  would  be  likely  to  be 
secured. 

Finally  mention  may  be  made  of  positions  which  have  been 
brought  under  the  rule  due  to  dissatisfaction  of  the  appointing 
officers  with  the  results  produced  by  the  Commission  in  at- 
tempting to  secure  qualified  persons  by  open  competitive  ex- 
amination. Sometimes  this  has  resulted  after  an  honest  at- 
tempt has  been  made  to  fill  the  positions  by  the  competitive 
method.^ 

No  one  can  read  the  enumeration  of  positions  thus  ex- 
empted from  the  system  of  competitive  examination  as  given 

*  For  a  detailed  statement  of  classified  positions  excepted  from  exam- 
ination under  Rule  II,  Section  3,  see  Appendices  to  the  Annual  Reports  of 
the  Civil  Service  Commission. 


62  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

in  the  annual  reports  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  without 
feeling-  that  adequate  grounds  are  in  many  cases  lacking  for 
the  exemption.  Many  of  the  positions  so  exempted  differ 
but  slightly,  if  at  all,  from  positions  in  the  filling  of  which 
the  system  of  competitive  examination  is  rigidly  applied. 
Especially  is  this  true  of  positions  exempted  on  the  ground 
that  they  are  of  a  confidential  character.  It  is  the  history 
of  all  civil  service  systems  that  when  competitive  methods 
are  first  applied  this  exception  is  applied  to  large  classes 
of  positions,  but  that  as  it  becomes  more  and  more  clearly 
demonstrated  that  positions  as  "confidential"  or  even  more 
"confidential"  than  the  excepted  positions  are  successfully 
filled  by  open  competition,  the  field  of  exceptions  is  greatly 
narrowed.  As  the  Civil  Service  Commission  said  some  years 
ago,  when  it  was  proposed  to  except  the  position  of  chief 
deputy  marshal  because  of  its  "confidential  character" : 

It  is  said  that  the  relation  of  the  marshal  and  his  chief 
deputy  is  one  of  a  confidential  character.  Until  1904  cash- 
iers in  the  Customs  Service  were  excepted  from  examination; 
cashiers  in  post  offices  were  excepted  until  1906.  Since  these 
positions  were  made  competitive  there  is  no  reason  to  suppose 
that  they  have  not  been  filled  as  successfully  under  the  civil 
service  rules  as  any  other  class  of  competitive  positions.  This 
fact  is  of  great  value  in  considering  the  present  question  be- 
cause it  shows  that  the  civil  service  rules  are  successfully  ap- 
plied to  a  class  of  positions  whose  duties  are  very  similar  to 
those  of  chief  office  deputies  and  which  were  for  many  years 
excepted  from  the  operation  of  the  rules  because  of  their  con- 
fidential and  responsible  nature.  The  objections  that  the  mar- 
shal should  be  personally  acquainted  with  a  chief  office  deputy 
before  his  selection  and  should  have  confidence  in  his  integ- 
rity, relial)ility,  and  efficiency,  and  that  the  chief  deputy  should 
be  acquainted  with  local  conditions  could  be  met  in  many  cases 
by  the  i)romotion  within  the  office  of  suitable  persons  or  by 
transfer  from  the  vast  number  of  competitive  employees  in 
other  parts  of  the  classified  service. 

From  the  records  available  it  is  not  clear  to  what  extent 
the  recommendations  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  have 
been  sought  or  respected  by  the  several  Presidents,  in  the  pro- 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         63 

mulgation  of  exceptions  from  competition.  In  certain  in- 
stances it  seems  clear  that  the  President  acted  without  refer- 
ence to  the  Commission ;  and  in  a  few  instances,  the  Commis- 
sion has  doubtless  been  flatly  overruled.  One's  general  im- 
pression is,  however,  that  here,  as  in  other  matters,  the  Com- 
mission might  have  displayed,  during  recent  years,  a  greater 
measure  of  aggressiveness  in  promoting  the  competitive  prin- 
ciple. While  occasional  references  to  the  undesirability  and 
needlessness  of  a  large  excepted  class  are  to  be  found  in  its 
annual  reports,  it  has  at  no  time  taken  a  strong  stand  in  the 
matter  or  made  any  really  energetic  attempt  to  secure  from 
the  President  a  thoroughgoing  revision  of  the  schedule  of 
excepted  positions  and  its  rigorous  restriction  to  those  posi- 
tions for  which  competitive  selection  is  really  impracticable. 
The  question  arises  whether  in  the  legitimate  field  of- ex- 
cepted positions,  it  is  desirable  or  proper  that  exceptions 
should  be  made  as  now  by  the  President  or  whether  it  would 
be  better  to  vest  that  authority  in  the  hands  of  the  Commis- 
sion itself.  From  almost  every  standpoint  it  would  seem  de- 
sirable to  pursue  the  latter  course.  The  exercise  of  this  power 
by  the  President  necessarily  renders  him  more  or  less  subject 
to  importunity  by  cabinet  members  and  other  political  officers 
and  the  constantly  increasing  volume  of  business  which  the 
President  must  transact  makes  it  increasingly  unlikely  that 
applications  by  department  heads  for  exceptions  will  receive 
the  careful  consideration  which,  from  the  standpoint  of  the 
personnel  system,  they  should. 

It  is  noteworthy  that  in  some  local  systems  the  power  of 
excepting  positions  from  competitive  requirements  is  regarded 
as  so  filled  with  possibilities  of  abuse  for  political  purposes 
that  not  only  is  the  power  vested  in  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission rather  than  in  the  executive,  but  even  its  exercise  by 
the  Commission  is  subject  to  review  by  higher  authority.  Thus 
in  the  case  of  New  York  City  the  exception  of  positions  from 
competition  by  the  local  commission  must  be  approved  by  the 
state  commission.  The  contrast  between  this  and  the  federal 
practice  is,  however,  but  one  illustration  of  the  dominant  power 


64  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

accorded  to  the  President  in  the  civil  service  administration 
as  opposed  to  that  usually  accorded  the  executive  in  state  and 
local  sytsems. 

In  this  connection,  however,  one  special  feature  may  be 
pointed  out.  In  determining  whether  a  particular  position 
should  be  excepted  there  is  involved,  in  a  measure,  an  ap- 
praisal of  the  efficiency  of  the  recruitment  methods  of  the  Civil 
Service  Commission,  the  only  justification  for  exception  in 
the  large  being  that  the  position  cannot  w'ith  equal  satisfaction 
or  expedition  be  filled  by  the  normal  competitive  method  of 
recruitment.  To  this  extent  there  is  valid  ground  for  ob- 
jection to  vesting  in  the  Civil  Service  Commission  the  power 
of  passing  on  requests  for  the  exception  of  positions,  since  it 
is  the  adequacy  of  the  commission's  own  methods  which  is  in 
effect  called  into  question.  The  experience  of  local  commis- 
sions, however,  and  the  record  of  the  federal  commission  itself 
in  making  recommendation  for  exceptions  of  this  character  in 
those  cases  w^here  it  has  been  asked  for  recommendation,  as 
w^ell  as  in  passing  on  requests  for  the  appointment  of  desig- 
nated individuals  to  positions  ordinarily  competitive,  seem  to 
indicate  that  little  is  to  be  feared  from  a  too  rigid  insistence 
by  the  Commission  on  competition  in  cases  where  competition 
is  not  really  suitable. 

Positions  Excepted  by  Statute. — From  time  to  time  Con- 
gress, by  statute,  has  placed  some  or  all  of  the  employees  of 
specific  services,  who  would  in  the  absence  of  special  statute 
fall  in  the  classified  service,  outside  the  general  power  of  "clas- 
sification" conferred  upon  the  President  by  the  civil  service 
act. 

The  exceptions  now  in  effect  are  employees  of  the  Inter- 
national Joint  Commission ;  deputy  collectors  of  internal  reve- 
nue; deputy  marshals;  all  employees  of  the  Federal  Reserve 
Board  and  of  the  Federal  Farm  Loan  Board;  commercial  at- 
taches and  a  clerk  to  each ;  certain  technical  and  expert  em- 
ployees of  the  Federal  Trade  Commission,  the  Shipping 
Board,  the  Tariff  Commission,  and  the  Veterans'  Bureau; 
immigration  inspectors  employed  in  the  enforcement  of  the 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         65 

contract  labor  law ;  and  even  special  technical  and  clerical 
services  needed  in  the  construction  of  hospitals  for  the  Public 
Health  Service.^  j      ^  ^ 

'  The  statutes  making  these  exceptions  are  as  follows : 

Deputy  Collectors  and  Deputy  Marshals. —  .  .  .  That  hereafter  any 
deputy  collector  of  internal  revenue  or  deputy  marshal  who  may  be  re- 
quired by  law  or  by  authority  or  direction  of  the  collector  of  internal 
revenue  or  the  United  States  marshal  to  execute  a  bond  to,  the  collector 
of  internal  revenue  or  United  States  marshal  to  secure  faithful  perform- 
ance of  official  duty  may  be  appointed  by  the  said  collector  or  marshal, 
who  may  require  such  liond  without  regard  to  the  provisions  of  an  act  of 
Congress  entitled  "An  act  to  regulate  and  improve  the  civil  service  of  the 
United  States,"  approved  January  sixteenth,  eighteen  hundred  and  eighty- 
three,  and  amendments  thereto,  or  any  rule  or  regulation  made  in  pursu- 
ance thereof,  and  the  officer  requiring  said  bond  shall  have  power  to  revoke 
the  appointment  of  any  subordinate  officer  or  employee  and  appoint  his 
successor  at  his  discretion  without  regard  to  the  act,  amendments,  rules, 
or  regulations  aforesaid.     (38  Stat.  208,  act  of  Oct.  22,  1913.) 

federal  Reserve  Board. —  .  .  .  All  such  attorneys,  experts,  assistants, 
clerks,  and  other  employees  shall  be  appointed  without  regard  to  the  pro- 
visions of  the  act  of  January  sixteenth,  eighteen  hundred  and  eighty-three 
(volume  twenty-two.  United  States  Statutes  at  Large,  page  four  hundred 
and  three),  and  amendments  thereto,  or  any  rule  or  regulation  made  in 
pursuance  thereof  :  Provided,  That  nothing  herein  shall  pi-event  the  Presi- 
dent from  placing  said  employees  in  the  classified  service.  (38  Stat.  262, 
act  of  Dec.  23,  1913.) 

Commercial  Attaches. — For  commercial  attaches,  to  be  appointed  by 
the  Secretary  of  Commerce,  after  examination  to  be  held  under  his  direc- 
tion to  determine  their  competency,  .  .  .  $100,000.  (38  Stat.  500,  act  of 
July  16.  1914) 

Federal  Trade  Commission. —  .  .  .  With  the  exception  of  the  secre- 
tary, a  clerk  to  each  commissioner,  the  attorneys,  and  such  special  experts 
and  examiners  as  the  commission  may  from  time  to  time  find  necessary 
for  the  conduct  of  its  work,  all  employees  of  the  commission  shall  be  a 
part  of  the  classified  civil  service,  and  shall  enter  the  service  under  such 
rules  and  regulations  as  may  be  prescribed  by  the  commission  and  by  the 
Civil  Service  Commission.     (38  Stat.  718,  act  of  Sept.  26,  1914.) 

Federal  Farm-Loan  Board. —  .  .  .  All  such  attorneys,  experts,  assist- 
ants, clerks,  laborers,  and  other  employees  and  all  registrars,  examiners, 
and  appraisers  shall  be  appointed  without  regard  to  the  provisions  of  the 
act  of  January  16,  1883,  .  .  .  and  amendments  thereto,  or  any  rule  or 
regulation  made  in  pursuance  thereof :  Provided,  That  nothing  herein 
shall  prevent  the  President  from  placing  said  employees  in  the  classified 
service.     (39  Stat.  361,  act  of  July  17,  1916.) 

Shipping  Board. —  .  .  .  With  the  exception  of  the  secretary,  a  clerk 
to  each  commissioner,  the  attorneys.,  naval  architects,  and  such  special 
experts  and  examiners  as  the  board  may  from  time  to  time  find  necessary 
to  employ  for  the  conduct  of  its  work,  all  employees  of  the  board  shall  be 
appointed  from  lists  of  eligibles  to  be  supplied  by  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission and  in  accordance  with  the  civil  service  law.  (39  Stat.  729,  act  of 
Sept.  7,  1916.) 

Tariff  Commission. —  .  .  .  With  the  exception  of  the  secretary,  a  clerk 
to  each  commis.'^ioner,  and  such  special  experts  as  the  commission  may 
from  time  to  time  find  necessary  for  the  conduct  of  its  work,  all  employees 
of  the  commission  shall  be  appointed  from  lists  of  eligibles  to  be  supplied 


G6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

In  the  cases  of  the  Federal  Reserve  Board  and  the  Fed- 
eral Farm  Loan  Board,  the  exception  from  the  statute  may 
be  revoked  by  the  President.  These  cases,  therefore,  consti- 
tute no  real  exception  to  the  civil  service  law.  The  difference 
is  that  under  the  civil  service  law  specific  action  by  the  Presi- 
dent is  required  to  except  positions  from  competition ;  whereas 
here  the  exception  is  made  by  statute  but  may  be  revoked  by 
the  President. 

The  language  employed  in  the  acts  providing  for  the  ex- 
ception is  far  from  uniform.  The  act  relating  to  deputy  col- 
lectors of  internal  revenue  and  deputy  marshals  provides  that 
they  "may  be  appointed  .  .  .  without  regard  to  the  pro- 
visions of  'the  civil  service  law'  or  any  rule  or  regulation  made 
in  pursuance  thereof."  The  same  language  is  used  in  the 
acts  relating  to  the  appointment  of  the  employees  of  the  Fed- 
eral Reserve  Board,  the  Federal  Farm  Loan  Board,  and  to  the 
persons  employed  to  enforce  the  contract  labor  law,  and  spe- 

by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  and  in  accordance  with  the  civil  service 
lav^r.     (39  Stat.  795,  act  of  Sept.  8,  1916.) 

Immigration  Service. —  .  .  .  said  Secretary,  in  the  enforcement  of  that 
portion  of  this  act  which  excludes  contract  laborers  and  induced  and 
assisted  immigrants,  may  employ;  for  such  purposes  and  for  detail  upon 
additional  service  under  this  act  when  not  so  engaged,  without  reference 
to  the  provisions  of  the  said  civil  service  act  .  .  .  such  persons  as  he  may 
deem  advisable  .  .  .   (39  Stat.  893,  act  of  Feb.  5,  1917.) 

Veterans'  Bureau. —  .  .  .  With  the  exception  of  the  director,  the 
commissioners,  and  such  special  experts  as  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury 
may  from  time  to  time  find  necessary  for  the  conduct  of  the  work  of 
the  bureau,  all  employees  of  the  bureau  shall  be  appointed  from  lists 
of  eligibles  to  be  supplied  by  the  Civil  .Service  Commission  and  in  accord- 
ance with  the  civil  service  law.  .  .  .  (40  Stat.  400,  act  of  Oct.  6,  1917, 
as  amended  by  the  act  of  August  9,  1921   (Public  No.  47,  67th  Congress).) 

Technical  and  Clerical  Services  in  Connection  xnnth  Construction  of 
Hospitals,  Public  Health  Service. — Sec.  10.  And  the  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury  is  hereby  authorized,  in  his  discretion,  to  employ,  for  service 
within  or  without  the  District  of  Columbia,  without  regard  to  civil  service 
laws,  rules,  and  regulations,  and  to  pay  from  the  sums  hereby  authorized 
and  appropriated  for  construction  purposes,  at  customary  rates  of  com- 
pensation, such  additional  technical  and  clerical  services  as  may  be  neces- 
sary, exclusively  to  aid  in  the  preparation  of  the  drawings  and  specifications 
for  the  above-named  objects  [additional  hospital  facilities  for  discharged 
sick  and  disabled  soldiers]  and  supervision  of  the  execution  thereof,  for 
traveling  expenses,  and  printing  incident  thereto,  at  a  total  limit  of  cost 
for  such  additional  technical  and  clerical  services  and  traveling  expenses, 
and  so  forth,  of  not  exceeding  $210,000  of  the  above-named  limit  of  cost. 
All  of  the  above-mentioned  work  shall  be  under  the  direction  and  super- 
vision of  the  Surgeon  General  of  the  Public  Plealth  Service,  subject  to 
the  approval  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury.     (40  Stat.,  1304.) 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         67 

cial  architectural  or  other  technical  experts  for  the  construction 
of  public  buildings.  The  remaining  acts  use  a  precisely  op- 
posite formula :  that  "with  the  exception  of  the  employees 
in  question,  all  other  employees  of  the  board  or  bureau  in 
question  "shall  be  appointed  from  lists  of  eligibles  to  be  sup- 
plied by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  and  in  accordance  with 
the  civil  service  law." 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  in  all  cases,  except  those  already 
mentioned  in  which  the  exclusion  from  the  civil  service  law 
is  only  tentative  and  may  be  terminated  by  the  President,  the 
act  definitely  excludes  the  employees  affected  from  any  pos- 
sible inclusion  under  the  provisions  of  the  civil  service  law 
generally.  There  would  seem  to  be  nothing  in  the  acts,  how- 
ever, which  would  prevent  the  President  from  exercising,  with 
reference  to  these  classes  of  employees  any  more  than  any 
others,  the  powers  conferred  on  him  by  the  act  of  1871.  Such 
being  the  case,  it  is  perfectly  possible  for  him,  despite  these 
provisions  of  law,  to  apply  to  these  positions  the  same  sys- 
tem of  selection  as  would  be  applied  were  they  under  the 
civil  service  law,  or  for  that  matter,  a  system  of  selection 
placing  on  the  discretion  of  the  appointing  officers  an  even 
more  severe  restriction  than  is  imposed  under  the  civil  serv- 
ice rules.  It  may  thus  be  said  that  the  acts  in  question  are 
merely  in  the  nature  of  a  moral  mandate  to  the  President  and 
in  no  W'ise  limit  his  power  over  the  system  of  selection  to  be 
applied  to  these  positions.  It  was  doubtless  this  power  which 
President  Wilson  had  in  mind  when  he  declared,  in  a  memo- 
randum explaining  his  approval  of  the  act  of  October  22, 
19 1 3,  exempting  deputy  collectors  of  internal  revenue  and  dep- 
uty marshals  from  the  operation  of  the  civil  service  acts,  that 
"The  control  of  the  whole  method  and  spirit  of  the  admin- 
istration of  the  proviso  in  this  bill  which  concerns  the  appoint- 
ment of  these  officers  is  no  less  entirely  in  my  hands  now  than 
it  was  before  this  bill  became  law."  ^  Perhaps,  however,  the 
reference  was  merely  to  the  control  possessed  by  the  President 

*  Thirty-first  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1914),  p.  138. 


68  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

by  virtue  of  his  general  power  of  direction,  based  on  his  power 
of  removal. 

It  need  hardly  be  said  that  no  justification  exists  for  any 
of  the  exceptions  to  the  civil  service  act  made  by  these  statutes. 
The  President  possesses  ample  authority  to  except  from  open 
competitive  selection  any  position  if  it  seems  to  him  that  the 
exception  will  facilitate  the  government's  work.  The  only 
explanation  for  this  succession  of  exceptions  from  the  com- 
petitive principle  is  the  irrepressible  desire  on  the  part  of  cer- 
tain elements  in  Congress  to  extend  the  area  of  political  ap- 
pointment. 

Exception  of  Designated  Individuals. — In  addition  to  the 
exception  of  specific  positions  made  by  the  rules  or  statutes, 
provision  is  made  by  the  rules  for  excepting  designated  indi- 
viduals from  the  requirement  of  competitive  examination.  The 
rules  provide  (Rule  II,  Sec.  lo)  : 

Whenever  the  commission  shall  find  that  the  duties  or  com- 
pensation of  a  vacant  position  are  such,  or  that  qualified  per- 
sons are  so  rare,  that,  in  its  judgment,  such  position  cannot, 
in  the  interest  of  good  civil-service  administration,  be  filled 
at  that  time  through  open  competitive  examination,  it  may 
authorize  such  vacancy  to  be  filled  without  competitive  exam- 
ination ;  and  in  any  case  in  which  such  authority  may  be  given, 
evidence  satisfactory  to  the  commission  of  the  qualifications 
of  the  person  to  be  appointed  without  competitive  examination 
shall  be  required.  A  detailed  statement  of  the  reasons  for 
its  action  in  any  case  arising  hereunder  shall  be  made  in  the 
records  of  the  commission  and  shall  be  published  in  its  annual 
report. 

As  distinguished  from  the  exceptions  made  by  the  Presi- 
dent which  apply  to  a  given  position  whenever  a  vacancy  occurs 
in  it,  those  under  this  rule  consist  only  in  filling  a  particular 
vacancy  at  a  particular  time.  To  make  this  interpretation 
doubly  sure  the  rule,  in  fact,  provides  that  "any  subsequent 
vacancy  in  such  position  shall  not  be  filled  without  competitive 
examination,  except  upon  express  authority  of  the  Commis- 
sion in  accordance  with  this  section."  The  rule  is  intended, 
of  course,  only  for  the  most  exceptional  use  and  ordinarily 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         69 

it  has  been  so  employed.  During  the  war,  however,  frequent 
use  was  made  of  it  by  the  War  Department,  the  War  Trade 
Board,  and  the  Department  of  Commerce. 

Two  classes  of  cases  are  embraced  under  the  rule.  In  the 
one  the  exception  from  competition  is  called  for  because  of 
the  nature  of  the  "duties  or  compensation" ;  that  is  presumably 
where  the  duties  are  so  arduous,  hazardous,  or  unattractive, 
and  the  compensation  so  low,  that  it  may  be  assumed  that  there 
will  be  no  competition  and  that  the  service  should  deem  itself 
fortunate  to  obtain  any  applicants  willing  to  accept.  Where 
such  condition  exists,  however,  it  would  seem  that  the  position 
itself  should  be  placed  in  the  excepted  class,  as  have  several 
positions  that  fall  in  this  category. 

The  second  class  under  this  rule  embraces  cases  in  which 
"qualified  persons  are  so  rare  that  open  competitive  examina- 
tion is  undesirable."  The  grounds  upon  which  this  provision 
can  be  defended  are  difificult  to  see.  The  fact  that  qualified 
persons  are  very  rare  so  far  as  the  knowledge  of  the  depart- 
ment or  the  Commission  goes,  would  seem  to  furnish  the  best 
possible  reason  why  open  competition  should  be  invited,  in  the 
hope  that  additional  qualified  persons,  whose  identity  may  not 
be  known  to  the  department  or  the  Commission,  may  present 
themselves.  It  may  be  urged,  however,  that  this  rule  permits 
the  designation  of  a  person  of  such  high  and  unusual  qualifica- 
tions that  he  would  decline  to  enter  a  competition  for  the  place. 
Examination  of  the  cases  in  which  the  Commission  has  actually 
applied  the  rule,  as  set  forth  in  its  Annual  Report,  does  not, 
however,  support  the  belief  that  such  instances  have  actually 
occurred.  In  point  of  fact  the  Commission  has  always  been 
studious  to  point  out  that,  under  the  method  of  non-assembled 
examination,  which  it  invariably  employs  for  the  higher  posts, 
applications  have  been  secured  from  individuals  of  the  highest 
distinction  in  their  several  lines  of  work. 

In  addition  to  this  method  of  excepting  designated  indi- 
viduals from  competition  which  is  recognized  by  the  rules,  the 
practice  has  grown  up  of  issuing  executive  orders  excepting 
designated    individuals    from    examination.     Persons    so    ap- 


70  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

pointed  have  all  the  rights  and  privileges  of  persons  appointed 
through  competitive  examination/  Under  a  practice  inaugu- 
rated by  President  Roosevelt,  requests  for  such  orders  are 
submitted  to  the  Civil  Service  Commission  for  recommenda- 
tion before  being  passed  on  by  the  President;-  but  instances 
are  relatively  numerous  in  which  the  President  has  issued  such 
orders,  despite  the  non-concurrence  of  the  Commission. 

The  practice  of  special  exception  by  the  President  has  de- 
veloped proportionately  to  the  increasing  rigidity  of  the  com- 
petitive system.  During  the  first  fifteen  or  twenty  years  after 
the  passage  of  the  act,  while  a  large  though  steadily  dimin- 
ishing area  still  remained  to  which  the  principle  of  competition 
had  not  yet  been  applied,  but  few  requests  were  made  to  the 
President  for  the  suspension  of  the  rules.  Since  the  applica- 
tion of  competitive  methods  to  virtually  all  positions  in  the 
classified  service,  which  became  effective  about  1900,  the  ex- 
ceptions have  averaged  about  one  per  week.  The  number  of 
exceptions  made  in  each  year,  beginning  with  1901,  is  as  fol- 
lows: 

1901    3      191 1    47 

1902    10      1912    66 

1903  30  1913  91 

1904  22  1914  yj 

1905  60  191S  91 

1906  71  1916  yi 

1907    17      1917    85 

1908    64      1918    '   13 

1909    38  

1910    55  973 

In  about  125  cases  the  Commission  has  advised  the  Presi- 
dent against  the  making  of  the  exception,  but  has  been  over- 

*  Minute  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  April  6,  1904.  Thirty-fifth 
Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission  (1918),  p.  65. 

'In  rare  instances  (perhaps  no  more  than  a  dozen  in  all)  this  practice 
has  been  ignored  by  the  President. 

^  The  small  number  of  exceptions  made  in  1918  was  doubtless  due  to 
the  fact  that  owing  to  the  war  emergency  there  were  in  force  a  large 
number  of  gerieral  orders  excepting  large  classes  of  positions,  and  in  some 
cases  the  entire  personnel  of  a  service,  from  competition,  so  that  it  was 
possible  for  virtually  everybody  to  find  employment  without  seeking  execu- 
tive intervention. 

\ 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         71 

ridden.''  In  all  the  remaining  cases,  except  a  very  few  where 
its  opinion  has  not  been  sought,  it  has  either  expressly  ap- 
proved or  offered  no  recommendation. 

By  far  the  most  common  reason  advanced  for  making  the 
exception  is  that  the  persons  whose  exception  is  proposed  pos- 
sess special  fitness  or  availability.  Of  the  973  orders  listed 
above  no  less  than  498  would  fall  under  this  head.  The 
plea  of  special  fitness  is  hardly  valid  since  the  open  competi- 
tive method  is  eminently  suitable  to  secure  the  services  of  the 
individual  whose  appointment  is  sought  if  he,  in  fact,  pos- 
sesses the  "special  fitness"  alleged.  As  an  illustration  of  the 
unconvincing  character  of  the  statements  made  in  connection 
with  some  of  the  executive  orders  making  exceptions  on  this 
ground  may  be  cited  the  following: 

Mrs. ,  of  California,  may  be  appointed  to  a  position 

in  the  United  States  Employment  Service  of  the  Department 
of  Labor,  without  reference  to  the  civil  service  rules.  Her 
appointment  is  recommended  by  the  Secretary  of  Labor.     It 

is    stated    that    Mrs.    possesses    qualifications    which 

eminently  fit  her  for  a  position  in  the  employment  service. 
The  Civil  Service  Commission  does  not  concur  in  the  recom- 
mendation. 

Under  the  head  of  "special  availability"  are  found,  for 
the  most  part,  cases  in  which  a  person  is  already  in  the  service 
in  one  capacity  and  whose  assignment,  transfer,  or  promotion 
to  the  position  desired  is  interdicted  by  the  rules.  In  a  few 
instances  it  may  be  that  the  situation  is  so  peculiar  that  spe- 
cial exception  should  be  resorted  to,  but  in  most  cases,  if  the 
rule  has  any  merit,  there  is  no  reason  for  setting  it  aside. 

A  related  class  of  cases,  and  the  next  largest  numerically, 
being  larger  indeed  than  all  the  remaining  classes  combined, 
is  that  in  which  the  person  in  whose  favor  the  exception  is 
made  has  been  separated  from  the  service  for  more  than  a 
year  and  is  thus  ineligible  for  reinstatement.  These  cases 
numbered  231  during  the  period  covered  by  the  figures  above 
given.  They  doubtless  indicate  that  the  rule  limiting  eligi- 
bility to  reinstatement  in  all  cases  to  one  year  is  unduly  severe, 


^2  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

and  at  a  subsequent  point  where  this  matter  is  considered  the 
recommendation  is  made  that  the  rule  should  be  made  more 
elastic.  Nevertheless,  so  long  as  it  remains  the  rule,  it  should 
be  enforced. 

Other  exceptions  of  persons  who  could  not  meet  one  or 
another  of  the  requirements  in  the  rules  (in  most  cases  with 
respect  to  physical  qualifications)  numbered  94  out  of  the  total 
of  973  exceptions  above  listed.  Here  again  the  same  con- 
sideration applies  as  in  the  two  preceding  cases. 

The  last  important  class  of  exceptions,  embracing  81  dur- 
ing the  period  covered,  is  made  up  of  cases  in  which  appoint- 
ment without  examination  was  permitted  to  a  woman  on  the 
death  or  disability  of  her  husband,  son,  or  brother,  upon  whom 
she  was  dependent  for  support.  At  first  blush,  the  mere 
fact  that  the  person  upon  whom  she  was  dependent  was  for- 
merly in  the  service  w^ould  seem  to  give  the  dependent  no  claim 
whatever  to  a  position  in  the  service.  Looked  at  from  the 
standpoint  of  the  employees  already  in  the  service,  however, 
much  may  be  said  for  a  policy  of  assuring  employment,  within 
such  limits  as  may  be  consistent  with  the  good  of  the  service, 
to  dependents  of  employees  left  without  support  upon  the 
death  or  disability  of  the  employee.  Such  a  policy  would  have 
an  obvious  value  in  making  the  service  attractive  to  the  em- 
ployee in  exactly  the  same  way  that  retirement  and  insurance 
benefits  do  so,  but  if  such  a  policy  is  adopted  it  should  be  care- 
fully formulated  and  promulgated  as  a  general  rule  to  the 
benefits  of  which  all  would  be  equally  entitled  under  like  con- 
ditions. Moreover,  careful  limitations  should  obviously  be 
placed  in  the  rule  to  safeguard  the  service  against  an  undue 
access  of  personnel  of  this  type.  Manifestly  none  of  these  re- 
quirements are  satisfied  by  the  practice  of  making  these  ex- 
ceptions by  executive  order. 

A  special  class  of  exceptions  embraces  cases  arising  from 
time  to  time,  through  the  discontinuance  of  certain  temporary 
agencies,  necessitating  the  discharge  of  employees.  In  the 
few  cases  of  this  kind  which  have  occurred  provision  has  been 
made  by  executive  order  permitting  the  appointment  of  these 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         73 

clerks  without  competitive  examination.  In  some  of  these 
cases  the  employees  had  originally  entered  the  service  of  the 
temporary  agency  without  examination,  so  that  there  was  little 
reason  for  these  exceptions  in  their  favor.  In  any  case,  how- 
ever, there  should  be  a  permanent  rule  to  cover  cases  of  this 
kind.  At  another  place  account  is  given  of  the  recent  es- 
tablishment under  executive  order  of  reemployment  registers 
which  should  make  any  further  exceptions  under  this  head 
entirely  unnecessary. 

In  summary,  the  sound  method  of  providing  for  any  meri- 
torious cases  which  are  now  taken  care  of  by  special  excep- 
tion would  seem  to  be  the  formulation  of  general  rules,  de- 
fining all  those  possible  classes  of  cases  in  which  an  exception 
from  competiton  seems  desirable.  A  study  of  the  large  num- 
ber of  such  special  exceptions  which  have  been  granted  in  the 
past  twenty  years  should  make  it  possible  to  bring  within  the 
sweep  of  such  rules  virtually  every  type  of  case  in  which  ex- 
ception should  properly  be  granted.  The  Commission  should 
then  be  authorized  to  pass  upon  individual  applications  under 
any  one  of  the  rules  thus  provided. 

Even  if  no  such  general  rules  are  framed,  however,  every 
consideration  would  seem  to  demand  that  the  Commission 
rather  than  the  President  should  be  vested  with  the  power  to 
grant  special  exceptions.  If  this  much  cannot  be  accomplished, 
the  President  at  least  should  make  it  a  rule  not  to  overrule  the 
recommendations  of  the  Commission  when  the  latter  recom- 
mends a  denial  of  the  application  for  special  exception,  and 
the  Commission  in  turn,  once  its  power  becomes  more  than 
that  of  mere  privilege  of  expressing  an  opinion,  should  make 
its  procedure  in  this  matter  more  formal.^ 
Laborers. — "Persons  employed  merely  as  laborers  and 
w^orkmen,"  as  already  stated,  are  excluded  specifically  from 
the  operation  of  the  civil  service  law.  They  fall,  however, 
under  the  more  inclusive  class  of  "persons  in  the  civil  serv- 

*The  National  Civil  Service  Reform  League  has  gone  on  record  as 
favoring  a  procedure  of  this  kind.  Good  Government,  vol.  33  (January, 
1916),  p.  15. 


74  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

ice  of  the  United  States"  covered  ])y  the  act  of  1S71,  and 
it  is,  therefore,  within  the  power  of  the  President  "to  pre- 
scribe snch  regulations  for  the  admission  of  persons"  as 
laborers  "as  may  best  promote  the  ef^ciency  thereof  and 
ascertain  the  fitness  of  each  candidate  in  respect  to  age, 
health,  character,  and  knowledge  and  ability."  Under  this 
authority  it  is  possible  for  the  President  to  set  up  a  system 
of  selection  identical  with  or  even  more  rigid  than  that 
which  he  may  have  prescribed  for  persons  to  whom  the 
civil  service  law  is  applicable.  But  as  in  the  case  of  the 
classes  of  employees  excepted  from  the  application  of 
the  civil  service  law  by  special  statutes  he  cannot  apply  to 
persons  employed  merely  as  laborers  or  workmen  the  other 
provisions  of  the  civil  service  law  or  other  statutes  relating 
exclusively  to  "classified"'  positions,  which  will  be  discussed 
under  subsequent  heads. 

In  fact,  the  President  has  established  a  system  of  open 
competitive  physical  examinations  for  this  class  of  personnel, 
which  now  covers  perhaps  a  majority  of  the  class.  The  pre- 
cise extent  and  character  of  this  system  will  appear  in  a  sub- 
sequent chapter. 

Strict  Construction  of  Exceptions  from  Formal  Methods 
of  Selection. — The  exceptions  from  formal  methods  of 
selection  which  have  been  reviewed  apply  in  some  cases  to 
specifically  designated  positions ;  in  others,  to  all  positions  of 
a  given  class  or  title.  Where  the  exception  is  of  the  latter 
class,  it  is  essential  that  precaution  be  taken  that  appointments 
under  the  "excepted"  procedure  be  confined  to  positions  really 
covered  by  the  exception ;  that  persons  be  not  ai)pointed  to 
excepted  or  unclassified  positions  and  then  assigned  to  duties 
properly  belonging  to  a  competitive  position.  The  largest  pos- 
sibilities for  this  kind  of  evasion  for  a  long  time  were  in  con- 
nection with  the  assignment  of  persons  appointed  as  "labor- 
ers" to  duties  properly  belonging  to  clerical  or  sub-clerical 
positions  in  the  competitive  classified  service. 

The  civil  service  law,  as  has  already  been  pointed  out,  ex- 
cluded from  the  operation  of  its  provisions  regarding  selection 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         75 

"any  person  merely  employed  as  a  laborer  or  workman"  (Sec- 
tion 7),  and  while  the  President  possesses  power  under  the 
act  of  1 87 1  to  apply  the  competitive  method  to  the  selection 
of  laborers,  he  did  not  exercise  that  power  till  1904,  and  then 
only  over  a  small  portion  of  the  field.  Hence  for  over  twenty 
years  after  the  enactment  of  the  civil  service  law,  the  labor 
positions  remained  outside  the  competitive  system,  and  indeed 
untouched  by  any  formal  method  of  selection,  except  in  the 
navy  yards,  where  a  system  of  formal  registration  was  in- 
troduced early.  It  is  not  surprising  that  the  tendency  to  use 
the  unguarded  entrance  gate  to  labor  positions  as  a  means  of 
evading  the  competitive  system  applied  to  the  clerical  positions 
should  have  reached  significant  proportions  within  a  few  years 
after  the  effective  application  of  that  system.  In  1898  the 
Civil  Service  Commission  thus  reviewed  the  situation  under 
this  head  as  it  had  developed  in  the  fifteen  years  since  the  en- 
actment of  the  civil  service  law : 

The  pressure  for  place,  being  removed  from  positions  cov- 
ered by  coAipetitive  examination,  is  concentrated  upon  those 
outside.  These  so-called  laborer  places  below  the  classified 
service  are  the  only  ones  which  can  now  be  obtained  through 
influence,  and  the  pressure  for  these  places  is  in  consequence 
very  great.  The  only  way  to  remedy  this  is  to  withdraw  places 
of  laborers  from  patronage  and  to  fill  them  under  the  registra- 
tion system,  which  has  proved  so  admirable  in  filling  places  of 
laborers  at  navy-yards. 

Since  1883,  when  the  civil  service  law  was  enacted,  there 
has  been  an  increase  of  about  37  per  cent  in  the  number,  and 
43  per  cent  in  the  salaries,  of  the  unclassified  places,  while 
tJiere  has  been  a  sliglit  decrease  in  the  number  of  positions 
originally  classified  by  the  civil  service  act,  as  well  as  a  de- 
crease in  the  appropriations  for  these  positions.  Practically 
all  of  the  increase  in  the  classified  positions  occurred  before 
they  were  included  in  the  classified  service.  The  tendency 
toward  increasing  the  number  of  unclassified  positions,  in 
evasion  of  the  civil  service  act,  is  not  peculiar  to  the  federal 
service.  The  same  abuses  have  been  practiced  in  States  where 
the  merit  system  has  been  established.^ 

*  Fifteenth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1898),  p.  271. 


76  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

It  would  be  of  little  value  to  review  here  the  long  succes- 
sion of  executive  orders  and  amendments  to  the  rules  which 
have  been  aimed  at  these  abuses.  Prior  to  1904  the  action 
taken  was  directed  principally  at  preventing  the  performance 
of  "classified"  duties,  that  is,  of  duties  not  actually  those  of 
a  "mere  laborer  or  workman,"  by  persons  employed  under  the 
title  of  laborer  and  thus  selected  without  examination  or  com- 
petition.^ The  inherent  difficulty  of  enforcing  such  orders, 
however,  owing  to  the  impossibility  of  any  central  inspection, 
over  the  vast  area  of  the  federal  service,  of  the  duties  actually 
performed  by  the  great  numbers  of  laborers,  is  obvious. 

At  the  present  time  the  terms  of  the  rules  on  this  point  are 
sufficiently  specific  and  mandatory.  They  provide  (Rule  II, 
Sec.  5)  that 

laborers  who,  in  connection  with  their  usual  duties,  are  to 
perform  work  of  the  grade  performed  by  classified  employees 
shall  be  appointed  upon  certification  by  the  commission  from 
appropriate  registers  of  eligibles  in  the  manner  provided  by 
these  rules :  and  a  person  employed  as  a  laborer  or  workman 
without  examination  under  these  rules  shall  not  be  assigned  to 
work  of  the  grade  performed  by  classified  employees. - 

In  order  to  keep  the  Civil  Service  Commission  advised  of 
the  conduct  of  the  department  in  applying  this  rule,  it  is  fur- 
ther provided  (Rule  XIII)  in  connection  with  the  requirement 

'  In  addition  these  rules  were  aimed  at  the  improper  promotion  of 
laborers  to  "classified"  positions.  This  matter  is  treated  in  a  subsequent 
chapter. 

*  "No  persons  shall  be  appointed  or  employed  in  any  executive  depart- 
ment or  office  for  the  performance  of  any  service  of  the  character  per- 
formed by  classified  employees,  except  in  accordance  with  tlie  provisions 
of  the  civil  service  rules ;  and  before  makinj^  any  appointment  or  employ- 
ment for  service  with  respect  to  which  there  may  be  a  reasonable  doubt 
as  to  the  requirement  of  examination  the  head  of  the  department  or  office 
shall  confer  with  the  Civil  Service  Commission  for  the  purpose  of  deter- 
mining whether  examination  is  required,  and  when  such  conference  does 
not  result  in  agreement  the  case  shall  be  presented  to  the  Attorney  General 
for  his  opinion."   (Executive  Order,  November  29,  1904.) 

".  .  .  Unclassified  laborers  may  be  assigned  to  classified  work  inci- 
dentally, but  not  as  a  part  of  their  main  work,  in  cases  where  such  work 
cannot  be  conveniently  and  economically  done  by  classified  employees,  but 
never  without  the  prior  consent  of  the  commission,  ol)lained  before  such 
assignment,  and  with  a  view  to  the  doing  of  the  particular  classified  work 
in  question  by  unclassified  employees."  (Executive  Order,  April  21, 
1909.) 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         yy 

(Section  i)  that  "every  nominating  or  appointing  officer  in 
the  executive  civil  service  shall  report  in  detail  to  the  com- 
mission whenever  and  in  such  manner  as  it  may  prescribe,  all 
changes  in  the  service  under  his  authority,  that  (Section  3)  : 

Reports  of  appointments  and  changes  in  status  of  mere 
laborers  or  workmen  shall  be  accompanied  by  a  statement 
setting  forth  specifically  the  kind  of  labor  performed  in  detail 
sufficient  to  enable  the  commission  to  determine  the  status  of 
each  position  as  classified  or  unclassified;  and  a  similar  state- 
ment of  duties  performed  by  any  employee  or  pertaining  to 
any  position  in  the  executive  civil  service  shall  be  furnished  to 
the  commission  on  request.  All  essential  changes  of  duties 
pertaining  to  persons  appointed  as  mere  laborers  or  workmen 
without  examination  under  the  civil  service  rules  shall  be  re- 
ported at  once  to  the  commission. 

In  the  regulations  which  have  been  promulgated  for  the 
application  of  the  competitive  method  to  labor  positions  in 
Washington,  it  is  provided  that : 

When  an  appointment  or  employment  of  an  unskilled  la- 
borer is  to  be  made,  the  appointing  officer  shall  request  the 
board  to  certify  eligibles,  stating  the  principal  duties  of  the 
position.  If  in  the  opinion  of  the  board  the  duties  are  of  the 
grade  performed  by  classified  employees,  the  fact  shall  be 
referred  to  the  Civil  Service  Commission  to  determine  the 
status  of  the  position  as  classified  or  unclassified  under  section 
3  of  civil  service  Rule  XIII,  and  the  vacancy  shall  be  filled  in 
accordance  with  such  finding. 

No  such  procedure  is  provided  in  the  case  of  appointments 
to  labor  positions  in  the  field  service,  the  regulations  simply 
providing  (VII,  Sec.   i)  that: 

If  a  position  of  laborer  requires,  in  connection  with  the 
usual  duties  of  mere  laborer,  the  performance  of  work  of 
the  grade  done  by  classified  employees,  it  should  be  filled  from 
a  register  for  the  classified  service  and  not  under  these  regu- 
lations.^ 

'These  regulations  also  provide  (V,  3^  that  "heads  of  offices  shall 
require  assistant  superintendents  or  foremen  of  divisions  or  crews  to  make 
monthly  reports  showing  specifically  the  kind  of  labor  performed  by  the 
unclassified  laborers  in  their  charge,  which  report  shall  be  open  to  the 
inspection  of  the  board  and  the  commission." 


78  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

A  person  appointed  to  an  unclassified  position  shall  not  be 
assigned  to  work  of  a  classified  competitive  position,  and  shall 
not  be  transferred  or  promoted  to  such  a  position  except  in 
accordance  with  the  Executive  Order  of  April  21,  1909,  via: 

It  appears  that  in  certain  cases  the  work  of  various  depart- 
ments, independent  offices,  and  bureaus  is  of  such  character 
that  it  cannot  be  economically  and  conveniently  done  consist- 
ently with  a  rigorous  adherence  to  the  division  between  classi- 
fied and  unclassified  work.  In  such  cases  classified  laborers 
are  engaged  for  the  greater  part  of  their  time  on  unclassified 
work,  but  at  the  same  time  there  is  certain  classified  work 
which  could  be  more  economically  and  conveniently  done  if 
such  laborers  were  permitted  to  do  it  incidentally,  and  not  as 
a  part  of  their  main  work  or  employment. 

It  is  therefore  ordered  that  hereafter  when  such  a  state  of 
things  exists  as  is  above  recited,  unclassified  lal)orers  may  be 
assigned  to  classified  work  incidentally,  but  not  as  a  part  of 
their  main  work,  in  cases  where  such  work  cannot  be  con- 
veniently and  economically  done  by  classified  employees,  but 
never  without  the  prior  consent  of  the  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion, obtained  before  such  assignment,  and  with  a  view  to 
the  doing  of  the  particular  classified  work  in  question  by  un- 
classified employees. 

It  is  difficult  to  ascertain  how  eff^ective  the  rules  and  regu- 
lations cited  have  been  in  preventing  the  employment  of  la- 
borers in  duties  other  than  those  appropriate  to  the  title.  In 
the  case  of  persons  appointed  as  laborers  in  the  field  service, 
the  regulations,  as  just  stated,  require  periodical  reports  to 
the  Civil  Service  Commission.  In  all  other  cases,  the  requir- 
ing of  such  repoi;ts  is  left  to  the  Commission.  The  Commis- 
sion has  not  required  by  regulation  the  submission  of  the  in- 
formation provided  for  by  the  rules  at  any  regular  periods ; 
nor  do  its  reports  in  recent  years  give  evidence  of  any  con- 
sistent attempt  to  secure  the  strict  enforcement  of  the  rules 
on  this  head. 

Since  the  application  of  the  competitive  method  to  the  se- 
lection of  laborers  in  certain  districts  in  1904,  and  its  gradual 
extension  since  that  time,  the  importance  of  the  distinction 
between  duties  appropriate  only  to   classified  positions,  and 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         79 

those  appropriate  to  the  positions  of  "mere  laborer  or  work- 
men" has  steadily  declined;  and  once  the  extension  of  the  com- 
petitive method  reaches  completion,  as  it  doubtless  will  in  the 
near  future,  this  distinction  will  become  different  only  in  de- 
gree, but  hardly  in  kind,  from  the  distinction  between  any 
two  other  classes  of  classified  positions. 

The  appointment  of  persons  to  positions  "excepted"  by 
the  rules  and  their  assignment  to  duties  properly  appertaining 
to  competitive  positions  is  a  possible  form  of  evasion  of  the 
competitive  principle  which,  in  the  earlier  days  of  the  sys- 
tem, when  the  "excepted"  positions  were  very  numerous,  was 
not  infrequently  resorted  to.  With  the  gradual  narrowing  of 
the  area  of  "excepted"  positions,  however,  and  the  specific 
provision  of  the  rules  that  "not  more  than  one  position  shall 
be  treated  as  excepted  under  the  title  of  any  such  position 
unless  a  dififerent  number  be  indicated,"  ^  the  opportunity  for 
this  type  of  evasion  has  been  diminished  to  a  point  where  it 
is  rather  negligible.  Substantially  the  same  may  be  said  of 
the  "non-competitive  positions."  A  zone  where  an  appreciable 
opportunity  for  this  type  of  evasion  still  exists,  however,  is 
in  those  services  (the  Shipping  Board,  the  Federal  Trade  Com- 
mission, the  Tariff  Commission,  the  Veterans'  Bureau  and  the 
Public  Health  Service)  which  have  been  authorized  by  statute  to 
appoint  specified  classes  of  technical  employees  and  such  other 
"special  experts"  as  may  be  needed.  Here  is  obviously  af- 
forded the  possibility  of  appointing  under  the  title  of  "special 
expert"  classes  of  personnel  who  by  no  stretch  of  conscience 
could  truthfully  be  so  designated.  While  naturally  no  of- 
cial  information  is  available  on  this  point,  there  is  reason  to 
believe  that  this  opportunity  has  not  escaped  the  notice  of  the 
skilled  job-hunter,  and  that  it  has  been  taken  advantage  of 
to  a  measurable  extent. 

Similarly  there  has  been  from  the  beginning  opportunity 
for  evasion  of  the  competitive  requirement  in  the  positions  of 
deputy  marshal  and  deputy  collector  of  internal  revenue,  which, 
as  already  noted,  are  excepted  from  competition  by  special 

*  Schedule  I,  Civil  Service  Rules,  Paragraph  i. 


8o  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

statute;  and  with  the  unprecedented  growth  of  the  internal 
revenue  service  in  recent  years  this  opportunity  has  cor- 
respondingly grown.  That  it  has  not  been  lost  sight  of,  but 
has  been  taken  advantage  of  to  the  full,  might  have  been  sur- 
mised; and  the  Civil  Service  Commission  is  authority  for  the 
statement  that  a  large  proportion  of  the  employees  "appointed 
under  the  designation  of  deputy  collector  without  reference 
to  the  rules  are  in  fact  employed  principally  as  clerks,  typists, 
addressograph  operators,  messengers,  etc."  ^ 

The  Civil  Service  Commission  to  date  has  adopted  no  pro- 
cedure designed  to  prevent  the  possible  abuse  in  the  manner 
indicated  of  excepted,  non-competitive,  and  statute-rxcepted 
positions.  In  connection  with  excepted  and  non-competitive 
positions,  as  already  suggested,  it  is  doubtful  if  there  is  any 
necessity  for  action.  In  connection  with  the  "special  expert 
positions"  excepted  by  statute,  however,  it  would  be  well  for 
the  Commission  to  obtain  from  the  President  an  executive  or- 
der requiring  each  of  the  establishments  which  enjoy  the  statu- 
tory exemption  to  obtain  a  certificate  from  the  Commission, 
prior  to  making  appointment  to  any  position  so  exempted,  that 
the  position,  under  the  statement  of  its  proposed  duties  cer- 
tified by  the  department,  is  properly  embraced  within  the  terms 
of  the  statute.^ 

Another  closely  related  evasion  against  which  it  is  neces- 
sary to  safeguard  the  competitive  service  is  the  improper  pro- 
motion or  transfer  to  competitive  positions  of  persons  holding 
positions  not  subject  to  examination — whether  "excepted"  or 
"unclassified"  positions.  The  regulations  bearing  on  this  point 
will  be  considered  in  the  chapters  on  promotion  and  transfers. 
Statistics  of  Employees  According  to  Method  of  Selection 
Status. — Thoroughly  satisfactory  statistics  are  not  avail- 
able showing  the  exact  distribution  of  the  federal  personnel 
among  the  several  primary  legal  classifications,  namely :  presi- 

*  Thirty-sixth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission, 
(iqiq),  p.  xxi. 

"This  sujTgestion  runs,  of  course,  on  the  assumption  that  statutory- 
exceptions  persist.  The  position  has  already  been  taken,  however,  that 
they  should  be  abolished. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         8i 

dential,  labor,  classified,  and  excepted  by  statutes ;  and,  still  less 
within  each  of  these  primary  legal  classifications,  the  numbers 
respectively  selected  by  competitive  or  non-competitive  exam- 
ination or  wholly  excepted  from  such  examination.  The  lat- 
est figures  under  this  head  are  those  published  in  the  Annual 
Report  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  for  191 7.  These 
show  the  number  of  federal  employees  on  June  30,  191 7,  un- 
der the  four  heads  of :  competitive  classified ;  excepted  and  non- 
competitive; unclassified;  and  presidential.  These  data,  some- 
what summarized,  are  given  on  the  following  pages . 
Tradition  in  Selection. — It  must  not  be  inferred  that  over 
the  whole  area  of  "excepted"  positions  and  of  "presidential" 
positions  to  which  no  formal  system  of  selection  has  been  ap- 
plied, selection  is  invariably  or  unqualifiedly  political.  Such 
is  far  from  the  case.  In  a  number  of  excepted  positions, 
despite  the  total  absence  of  formal  methods  of  selection,  merit 
controls  almost  exclusively;  in  others  merit  and  political  con- 
siderations mingle  in  uncertain  degree,  varying  even  with  re- 
spect to  the  same  position  from  one  time  to  another.  Prob- 
ably in  only  a  minority  of  "excepted"  positions  (if  the  numer- 
ous deputy  marshals  and  deputy  revenue  collectors  be  ex- 
cluded) is  appointment  determined  solely  by  politics.  In  the 
"presidential"  positions  to  which  no  formal  method  of  selec- 
tion is  applied  the  situation  is  equally  varied,  at  least  with 
respect  to  appointment  at  Washington.  Certain  of  the  bureau 
headships  are  filled  solely  on  a  merit  basis;  others  solely  on 
political  grounds.^ 

Again  where  it  is  stated  that  selection  is  controlled  by 
political  considerations  it  is  not  intended  to  imply  that  all  con- 
siderations of  efficiency  and  fitness  are  ignored.  In  not  a  few 
of  the  posts  which  will  hereinafter  be  characterized  as  being 
filled  by  political  appointees,  the  incumbents  are,  and  often 
customarily  have  been,  men  well  equipped  for  their  posts ;  but 
they  are  none  the  less  political  appointees  In  that  they  have 
been  selected,  not  for  outstanding  qualifications  which  distin- 

*The  actual  tradition  in  this  regard  in  respect  to  the  general  classes  of 
excepted  and  presidential  positions  is  discussed  in  the  next  chapter. 


82 


THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 


Positions  by  Status,  June  30,  1917 


Department 


Grand  Total  of  Table  . . . 

In  Washington,  D.  C. 

White  House 

State  Department 

Treasury  Department 

War  Department  

Navy  Department   

Post  Office  Department   . . . 
Interior  Department   

St.  ElizalDeth's  Hospital   . 

Miscellaneous    

Department  of  Justice   .... 
Department  of  Agriculture. 
Department  of  Commerce  . 
Interstate    Commerce    Com- 
mission    

Civil  Service  Commission  . 

Bureau  of  Efficiency  

Smithsonian  Institution  and 

Bureaus    

State,  War,  and  Navy  De- 
partment Building  .... 

The  Panama  Canal   

Government  Printing  Office 
Federal  Trade  Commission. 

Total :  in  Washington,  D.  C. 


Number  of  Positions  on 

June  30 

Tj    ' 

c  E 

rt    0 

Un- 

Total 

'"ti  ^ 

13    ,    <u 

w       > 

classi- 

1^ 

xcep 
Non 
petiti 

fied 

u 

W 

497,867 

326,899 

125,740 

33,094 

39 

36 

3 

376 

280 

81 

10 

9464 

8,693 

61 

684 

4,558 

4,360 

30 

161 

1,741 

1,725 

II 

3 

1,555 

1,452 

13 

84 

5,14; 

4,604 

169 

330 

1.138 

1,135 

3 

204 

135 

69 

1.500 

257 

354 

32 

5,251 

4,371 

461 

416 

3,176 

2,384 

22 

749 

978 

814 

130 

24 

240 

227 

I 

7 

42 

41 

77^ 

468 

5 

305 

258 

157 

I 

100 

135 

109 

14 

12 

4.593 

4,120 

5 

■      467 

244 
41,417 

145 

93 

I 

35,477 

1,490 

■   3,457 

Presi- 
den- 
tial 


12,134 


5 
26 

7 
2 
6 

44 


'857 

3 

21 

10 

5 
I 


993 


*  Secretary,  2  assistant  secretaries,  19  bureau  officers,  Indian  allotting 
agent,  recorder  of  deeds,  register  of  wills,  10  members  of  Board  of  Indian 
Commissioners,  and  9  meml)ers  of  board  of  visitors  to  St.  Elizabeth's 
Hospital. 

'Officers  of  the  Dcpartn-'cnt,  18;  commissioners  of  deeds,  23;  notaries 
public  for  the  District  of  Columbia,  800;  trustees  reform  school,  16. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         83 
Positions  by  Status,  June  30,  1917 — Continued 


Numbe 

r  of  Positions  on  June  30,  1917 

<U  "O 

rt    0 

.'■5  S 

-o  V  ^ 

Un- 

Presi- 

Department 

Total 

classi- 

den- 

a, a 

§0 

xcep 
Noi 
peti 

fied 

tial 

U 

W 

Outside  Washington,  D.  C. 

Treasury  Department 

Assistant    Custodian    and 

Janitor       Service      and 

contingent      force      on 

public  buildings    

5,441 

2,562 

52 

2,827 

Mint  and  Assay  Service  . 

908 

717 

30 

145 

16 

Subtreasury   Service    .... 

400 

390 

I 

9 

Public  Health  Service   . . 

3,518 

1,939 

1,263 

124 

192 

Coast  Guard  Service   . . . 

54 

54 

Customs   Service    

6,461 

5,646 

215 

491 

109 

Internal  Revenue  Service 

4,927 

3,044 

1,813 

6 

64 

Miscellaneous    

432 

176 

250 

6 

War  Department 

Quartermaster  Corps   . . . 

10,545 

6,446 

1,181 

2,918 

Ordnance   Department   at 

larere   

11,387 

9,500 

89 

1,798 

****o            ................ 

Engineer    Department    at 

larere   

15,767 

8,764 

916 

6,087 

Miscellaneous    

3,305 

1,678 

827 

800 

Navy  Department 

Exclusive    of   trades    and 

labor  positions   

4,679 

4,659 

19 

I 

Trades  and  labor  positions 

40,000 

32,000 

8,000 

Post  Office  Department   . . . 

522 

522 

Post  Office  except  fourth- 

class  postmasters   

187,982 

79,221 

96,785 

1,642 

10,334 

Fourth-class  postmasters. 

45,079 

45,079 

Rural  Carrier  Service  . . . 

43,339 

43,339 

Railv^^ay  Mail  Service  . . . 

21,191 

21,191 

Department  of  the  Interior 

Land  Service   

1,311 

1,062 

25 

14 

210 

Pension    examining    sur- 

geons     

4,502 

4,502 

4,453 

7 

Indian  Service   

7,665 
3,853 

I    2,';95 

811 

6 

Reclamation  Service  .... 

'   3,842 

4 

Miscellaneous    

969 

558 

386 

18 

7 

g4  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Positions  by  Status,  June  30,  1917 — Continued 


Department 


Outside  Washington,  D.  C. — 

Continued 
Department  of  Justice   . . . . 
Department  of  Agriculture. 
Department  of  Commerce   . 

Lighthouse  Service  

Steamboat  Inspection  Ser 

vice   

Department  of  Labor 
Immigration    Service    

Miscellaneous    

Interstate    Commerce    Com- 
mission    

Civil  Service  Commission  , 
Panama  Canal  Service  ^  . . . 

Total,    Outside    Washing 
ton,  D.  C 


Number  of  Positions  on  June  30,  1917 


Total 


3,012 

15,018 

204 

6,655 

371 

I,QIQ 

2,668 

1,392 

36 

938 


>    <u 


o  ^ 
U 


rt    O 


^g 


Un- 
classi- 
fied 


456,450 


732 
8,570 

3,041 

355 

1,500 
179 

1,371 
36 

854 


Presi- 
den- 
tial 


291,422 


2,097 

5,553 

204 

2,419 

7 
895 

1,195 

6 

209 
844 

202 
1,645 

21 

84 

124,250 

29,6371 

176 


10 


11,141 


guished  them  as  peculiarly  qualified  for  the  particular  post, 
but  because  of  political  services  rendered  the  party  in  power. 
Should  another  party  come  into  power,  they  would  be  replaced 
by  men  probably  equally  as  well  equipped,  appointed  for  po- 
litical service  rendered  the  incoming  party.  The  significant 
thing  is  that  they  are  not  a  permanent  part  of  the  adminis- 
trative personnel,  but  a  transient  group  of  political  careerists, 
to  whom  service  in  the  administrative  branch  of  the  govern- 
ment is  but  an  incident  in  a  political  career,  which  may  embrace 
equally  legislative  or  even  judicial  posts. 
Term  of  Office. — The  only  "presidential"  officers  at 
Washington  in  the  general  Departmental  Service  who  have  a 

*  Not  including  unclassified  and  excepted  working  force  which,  on  June 
30,  1917,  numbered  19,938. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         85 

definite  term  of  office  are  the  Comptroller  of  the  Currency,  the 
Director  of  the  Mint,  the  Surgeon  General  of  the  Public 
Health  Service,  the  Director  of  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Sur- 
vey, the  Commissioner  of  Labor  Statistics,  the  Purchasing 
Agent  of  the  Post  Office  Department,  and  the  members  of  the 
several  independent  boards  and  commissions  (except  the  Civil 
Service  Commission).  The  term  of  office  provided  for  the 
Comptroller  of  the  Currency  and  the  Director  of  the  Mint 
is  five  years;  for  the  Surgeon  General  of  the  Public  Health 
Service,  four  years ;  ^  for  the  several  boards,  from  three  to 
twelve  years.  The  term  of  the  Postmaster  General  is  fixed  by 
law  as  being  "for  and  during  the  term  of  the  President  by 
whom  he  is  appointed,  and  for  one  month  thereafter,  unless 
sooner  removed."  ^  As  opposed  to  these  officers  at  Washing- 
ton, the  local  chief  officers  appointed  by  the  President  and 
Senate  are  in  almost  all  cases  appointed  for  a  term  of  four 
years.  These  are  the  sole  provisions  of  law  regarding  term  of 
office  of  "presidential"  officers.  With  these  exceptions,  all 
"presidential"  officers  of  the  United  States  have  an  indefinite 
tenure  of  office  or  employment. 

The  four-year  term  of  the  local  officer,  far  from  affording 
protection  against  political  removal,  almost  inevitably  makes 
his  office  a  political  one,  since  at  the  expiration  of  his  term  he 
continues  in  office  only  until  his  successor  is  appointed. 
Moreover,  if  appointed  at  the  beginning  of  one  administration, 
as  a  large  proportion  of  these  officers  usually  are,  the  ques- 
tion of  reappointment  will  arise  automatically  at  the  beginning 
of  the  next  administration,  the  open  season  for  all  political 
appointments  and  removals.     The  existence  of  this  four-year 

^  While  the  Surgeon  General  of  the  Public  Health  Service  is  at  pres- 
ent appointed  for  a  term  of  four  years  this  term  is  not  fixed  by  law. 
The  regulations  of  the  Public  Health  Service  provide  that  the  term  of 
ofifice  of  the  Surgeon  General  shall  be  four  years,  but  since  the  regulations 
are  promulgated  by  the  President  he  may  amend  or  ignore  them.  From 
1871  to  191 1  the  Public  Health  Service  (Marine  Hospital  Service  and 
Public  Health  and  Marine  Hospital  Service)  had  only  four  surgeons 
general.  After  a  vacancy  had  been  created  by  death  in  191 1,  President 
Taft  in  1912  appointed  the  new  Surgeon  General  for  a  term  of  four 
years.  The  incumbent  was  reappointed  by  1916,  but  a  new  head  of  the 
service  was  appointed  in  1920. 

^  Revised  Statutes,  Sec.  388. 


86  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

term  thus  presents  an  almost  insuperable  obstacle  to  the  growth 
of  an  effective  tradition  of  selection  for  merit.  It  is  conceiv- 
able, of  course,  that  if  the  original  selection  for  any  group  of 
these  officers  were  placed,  as  the  appointment  of  presidential 
postmaster  is  now  in  process  of  being  placed,  upon  a  forraalized 
basis,  dependent  solely  on  merit,  the  renomination  and  con- 
firmation at  the  expiration  of  the  four-year  period  of  those 
who  had  rendered  satisfactory  service  would  become  auto- 
matic. Under  these  conditions  the  tenure  would  resemble 
that  of  the  officers  of  many  corporations  who  hold  by  election 
by  the  board  of  directors  from  year  to  year.  Nevertheless  the 
conditions  of  public  life  are  so  much  more  precarious  that  even 
such  a  basis  would  be  unsatisfactory..  With  the  appointing 
power  vested  in  a  political  officer,  all  administrative  officers 
jjhould  hold  office  indefinitely  during  good  behavior. 

In  the  case  of  the  independent  boards  and  commissions  the 
terms  are  not  only  fixed  but  overlapping  so  that  at  most 
one  vacancy  occurs  a  year.  This  fact,  combined  with  the  mul- 
tiple membership  of  these  bodies,  brings  it  about  that  it  will 
ordinarily  be  impossible  for  the  President,  except  by  a  whole- 
sale removal  of  members  at  the  beginning  of  his  adminis- 
tration, to  change  the  political  or  personal  complexion  of  the 
body.  The  same  situation  might  exist,  of  course,  if  the  tenure 
of  these  officers  were  indefinite,  but  it  may  be  that  in  the 
case  of  some  of  the  boards  there  would  then  exist  a  stronger 
temptation  to  wholesale  removal  by  enforced  "resignations" 
at  the  beginning  of  an  administration.  The  long  fixed  term 
in  these  cases  has  a  moral  value.  It  seems  to  give  the  incum- 
bent something  of  a  vested  right  in  the  office  for  the  statutory 
period,  while  indefinite  tenure  carries  no  such  force.  The 
superficially  inconsistent,  but  nevertheless  correct,  conclusion 
thus  seems  to  be  that  whereas  in  the  case  of  an  individual  of- 
ficer a  fixed  term  is  merely  a  recurrent  invitation  to  removal 
for  political  reasons,  in  the  case  of  a  board  of  large  member- 
ship, fixed  terms,  particularly  where  arranged  to  overlap,  fur- 
nish a  measure  of  security  against  such  removal. 

The  term  of  office  of  all  non-presidential  officers  and  em- 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         87 

ployees  is  indefinite.  It  would  seem  to  go  without  saying  that 
this  should  properly  be  so — that  in  the  government  service  the 
subordinate  personnel  should  hold  during  good  behavior — yet 
periodically  the  proposition  is  made  that  all  the  federal  em- 
ployees should  be  placed  on  a  fixed-term  basis.  No  longer  ago 
than  1896,  the  platform  of  the  Democratic  party  declared 
against  "life  tenure  in  office"  and  favored  "fixed  terms  of  of- 
fice." In  191 2  a  bill  fixing  a  seven-year  term  for  all  classi- 
fied employees  actually  passed  both  Houses  of  Congress  and 
was  saved  from  enactment  only  by  the  veto  of  President  Taft. 
In  19 1 4  bills  were  again  introduced,  one  calling  for  a  ten- 
year  tenure  and  one  for  a  six-year  tenure.  Even  in  1918  in 
the  report  of  a  wholly  non-puhtical  body,  the  Tariff  Commis- 
sion, we  find  the  same  curious  notion  cropping  up  in  the  recom- 
mendation that  while  the  appointment  of  collectors  of  the  cus- 
toms should  be  placed  upon  a  strictly  merit  basis,  their  terms 
of  office  should  be  fixed  at  six  years. 

The  philosophy  behind  these  proposals  is  in  some  cases 
none  other  than  the  familiar  one  of  "rotation  in  office."  In 
his  letter  of  acceptance  to  the  Democratic  Convention  of  1896 
the  candidate  for  President,  William  Jennings  Bryan,  com- 
menting on  the  plank  above  referred  to,  declared  that  "a  per- 
manent office-holding  class  is  not  in  harmony  with  our  in- 
stitutions ;  a  fixed  term  in  appointive  office,  except  where  the 
Federal  Constitution  now  provides  otherwise,  would  open  the 
public  service  to  a  large  number  of  citizens  without  impairing 
its  efficiency,"  and  in  his  convention  speech  he  had  indeed  given 
a  still  more  naive  expression  to  this  doctrine,  saying  "what 
we  oppose  in  that  plank  is  the  life  tenure  which  is  being  built 
up  at  Washington  which  excludes  from  participation  in  its 
benefits  all  the  humbler  members  of  our  society." 

The  more  recent  attempts  to  enact  a  fixed  tenure  of  office 
for  classified  employees  have  generally  proceeded,  however,  on 
the  ostensible  ground  that  only  by  such  methods  may  the  evils 
of  superannuation  in  the  Federal  service  be  avoided  without 
the  enormous  burden  of  a  retirement  system.  Quite  aside 
from  the  objection  that  the  remedy  proposed  is,  from  every 


88  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE  . 

sound  consideration  of  personnel  administration,  far  worse 
than  the  disease,  it  is,  of  course,  certain  as  pointed  out  by 
President  Taft  in  his  veto  message,  that  such  a  measure  would 
be  ineffective  to  prevent  superannuation  unless,  indeed,  it  went 
to  the  extreme  of  absolutely  prohibiting  the  reemployment 
of  any  person  at  the  expiration  of  the  fixed  term.  The  pro- 
posals in  question,  however,  have  provided  in  each  case  that 
a  person  separated  by  their  terms  from  the  classified  service, 
may  be  reappointed,  in  the  discretion  of  the  head  of  the  depart- 
ment, without  examination  for  another  term.  As  President 
Taft  pointed  out  in  his  message  vetoing  the  proposed  act  of 
1912,  "it  has  been  found  impossible  to  secure  an  enforcement 
of  the  present  law  which  requires  every  person  who  is  not 
eflfiicient  in  the  service  of  the  government  to  be  discharged,  be- 
cause it  imposes  upon  the  heads  of  departments  and  bureaus 
the  disagreeable  and  ungracious  duty  of  throwing  out  of  em- 
ployment, without  any  means  of  livelihood,  the  men  and  women 
who  have  spent  many  years  in  the  employment  of  the  gov- 
ernment and  in  times  past  have  rendered  good  service.  ,  .  . 
There  will  be  the  same  pressure  to  retain  the  clerk  at  the  end 
of  the  seven  years  as  there  was  to  maintain  his  minimum  rate, 
and  the  same  reluctance  as  in  the  present  system  to  turn  him 
out  at  an  advanced  age  without  means  of  a  livelihood  after 
long  years  of  service." 

Over  a  large  area  of  the  service,  while  the  tenure  is  legally 
indefinite,  tradition  requires  that  the  incumbent  resign  on 
change  of  administration,  this  being  the  accepted  ceremonial 
method  of  effecting  removal.  Should  any  incumbent  to  whose 
office  this  tradition  applies  violate  the  official  etiquette  by  fail- 
ing to  tender  his  resignation  voluntarily,  it  would  be  asked  for. 

In  the  case  of  the  Comptroller  of  the  Currency  and  the  Di- 
rector of  the  Mint,  despite  the  unique  five-year  term,  which,  if 
regularly  adhered  to,  would  find  every  fifth  presidential  admin- 
istration opening  with  these  two  officers  newly  appointed  for 
a  five-year  term  by  the  retiring  president,  it  has  been  customary 
for  the  incumbent  of  these  offices  to  resign  upon  a  change  of 
administration.     Such  a  custom,  of  course,  sets  at  naught  any 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         89 

provision  regarding  term  of  office.  The  local  officer  appointed 
for  a  four-year  term  generally  continues  in  office  for  a  con- 
siderable period  after  the  change  of  administration,  awaiting 
the  expiration  of  his  term  or  the  appointment  of  his  successor. 

In  the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission,  the  only  inde- 
pendent board  having  fixed  tenure  of  office  which  antedated 
the  Wilson  administration,  the  custom  has  never  developed  of 
resigning  upon  change  of  administration ;  and  it  does  not  seem 
probable  that  such  a  custom  will  develop  in  the  several  boards 
created  since  1913. 

Over  the  remainder  of  the  service,  in  which  indefinite  legal 
tenure  prevails,  the  general  rule  is,  of  course,  that  there  is  no 
tradition  requiring  resignation  in  the  positions  to  which  selec- 
tion is  by  formal  methods,  whether  competitive  or  non-com- 
petitive. As  to  the  positions  for  which  no  formal  methods  of 
selection  obtain,  the  tradition  regarding  resignation  closely 
follows  that  regarding  selection.  Where  the  tradition  of 
selection  on  merit  is  firmly  fixed,  it  is  no  longer  customary, 
generally  speaking,  for  the  incumbent  to  tender  resignation  on 
a  change  of  administration;  and  where  this  is  done,  the  tender 
is  perfunctory  and  not  real.  Where  the  tradition  of  selection 
is  frankly  and  unequivocally  political,  the  tender  is  invariably 
made  and  almost  as  invariably  accepted.  In  the  twilight  zone, 
in  which  not  a  few  "presidential"  and  "excepted"  positions  lie, 
where  the  tradition  of  selection  is  not  firmly  settled  on  either  a 
merit  or  political  basis,  the  tender  of  resignation  is  not  cus- 
tomary. It  should  be  noted  that  many  of  the  positions 
specially  excepted  by  statute  from  the  application  of  the  pro- 
visions of  the  civil  service  law  regarding  selection  fall  under 
the  newer  independent  boards  and  commissions  which,  because 
of  their  plural  membership  and  overlapping  fixed  terms,  do 
not  experience  a  "change  of  administration"  in  the  same  way 
as  do  executive  departments.  The  tenure  of  the  incumbents 
of  these  statute-excepted  positions,  therefore,  tends  to  be  in- 
definite in  fact  as  well  as  in  law. 

Protection  against  Removal  for  Political  Reasons. — The 
Constitution  is  entirely  silent  on  the  question  of  removal  (ex- 


90  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

cept  as  the  provisions  regarding  impeachment  fall  under  this 
head).  Since  it  is  settled  law  that  in  the  absence  of  express 
provisions  to  the  contrary,  the  power  to  remove  is  an  incident  of 
the  power  to  appoint,  it  might  be  argued  that  as  to  those  posi- 
tions to  which  appointment  is  by  express  provisions  of  the  Con- 
stitution required  to  be  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Sen- 
ate, removal  should  also  be  by  the  advice  and  consent  of  that 
body.  Again,  as  to  those  officers  the  power  of  whose  appoint- 
ment resides  in  the  President  and  Senate  wholly  by  virtue  of 
statute  (whether  expressly  or  by  omission  to  specify)  sound 
theory  would  seem  to  require  that  Congress  may  limit  the 
power  of  removal  in  any  way  it  sees  fit,  since  the  power  of 
appointment  is  wholly  its  creation.^ 

The  settled  practice  of  the  government,  however,  has  been 
otherwise  from  the  beginning,  the  President  alone  exercising 
the  power  of  removal  from  all  "presidential"  positions.  Nor 
has  Congress  in  any  case  prescribed  anything  constituting  a  real 
limitation  on  the  power  of  the  President  to  remove  those  whom 
he  has  appointed  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate.^ 
In  a  few  cases  it  has  prescribed  what  might  be  termed  moral 
restrictions.  If  the  Comptroller  of  the  Currency  or  the  Di- 
rector of  the  Mint  are  removed  before  the  expiration  of  the 
five-year  period,  the  President  must  communicate  the  reasons 
to  the  Senate.  In  the  creation  of  the  independent  boards  and 
commissions  of  recent  years,  several  of  which  have  powers 

'  The  power  of  the  President  to  remove  military  and  naval  officers  is 
very  greatly  limited  by  statute,  and  from  a  constitutional  standpoint  there 
is  no  reason  why  the  President's  power  of  removal  of  civil  officers  should 
be  less  subject  to  the  control  of  Congress;  in  fact,  there  is  less  reason  why 
it  should  be  exempt  from  Congressional  control,  in  that  over  the  army 
and  navy  the  President  is  constitutionally  commander-in-chief,  a  position 
which  he  does  not  constitutionally  occupy  over  the  civil  establishment. 

'As  is  well  known.  Congress,  in  1867,  in  tlie  course  of  its  conflict  with 
President  Johnson,  enacted  the  so-called  "Tenure  of  Office  Acts"  (Act  of 
March  2,  iS6y,  14  Stat.  430,  and  Act  of  April  5,  1869,  16  Stat.  6,  both  con- 
tained in  Revised  Statutes,  Sees.  1767-1775),  by  which  the  advice  and  con- 
sent of  the  Senate  was  required  for  the  removal  of  any  officer  whose 
appointment  is  made  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate.  It  was 
the  refusal  to  ol)ey  this  law  that  constituted  one  of  the  principal  articles 
in  the  bill  of  impeachment  brought  against  Johnson.  The  constitutionality 
of  this  act  was  never  squarely  brought  before  the  courts,  and  after  the 
failure  of  the  impeachment  it  became  a  dead  letter,  but  was  not  actually 
repealed  until  1887  (Act  of  March  3,  1887,  24  Stat.  500). 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         91 

which  might  be  denominated  quasi- judicial,  it  has  provided 
that  removal  before  the  expiration  of  the  statutory  term  pro- 
vided (which  varies  from  three  to  twelve  years)  shall  be  only 
for  reasons  connected  with  the  good  of  the  service.  Aside 
from  these  special  cases,  the  power  of  the  President  to  remove 
from  offices  to  which  he  has  appointed  is  unlimited.  It  may  be 
said,  therefore,  that  there  exists  no  legal  restriction  on  the 
power  of  removal  from  presidential  positions. 

Since  all  appointing  power  other  than  that  exercised  by  the 
President  and  Senate  is  derived  wholly  from  statute,  the  power 
to  determine  the  conditions  under  which  any  "non-presidential" 
officer  or  employee  may  be  removed  is  wholly  within  the  con- 
trol of  Congress.  The  right  to  remove  may  be  limited  by 
statute  in  any  way  or  may  even  be  conferred  upon  an  authority 
other  than  the  appointing  authority.  But  the  only  provision 
of  law  which  Congress  has  in  fact  enacted,  designed  to  limit 
the  power  of  removal  from  non-presidential  positions,  other 
than  acts  applicable  solely  to  the  competitive  class,  is  that  found 
in  the  civil  service  act  (Sec.  13)  and  now  embodied  in  the 
Criminal  Code  of  1910  (Sec.  119).  This  provision  forbids 
any  officer  of  the  United  States  (other  than  the  President,  who 
is  not  included  in  its  terms)  to  "discharge  .  .  .  any  other  of- 
ficer or  employee,  for  giving  or  withholding  or  neglecting  to 
make  any  contribution  of  money  or  other  valuable  thing  for 
any  political  purpose." 

In  addition  the  act  specifies,  as  one  of  the  "eight  funda- 
mental provisions,"  which  it  authorizes  and  enjoins  upon  the 
President  to  "provide  and  declare"  in  the  rules  promulgated  by 
him,  "that  no  person  in  the  public  service  is  for  that  reason 
under  any  obligations  to  contribute  to  any  political  fund,  or 
render  any  political  service,  and  that  he  will  not  be  removed 
or  otherwise  prejudiced  for  refusing  to  do  so."  '     It  will  be 

*The  mandate  to  the  President  on  this  point  is  subject  to  the  qualifica- 
tion that  is  applied  by  the  terms  of  the  act  to  all  the  "eight  fundamental 
provisions,"  namely  that  they  shall  be  provided  for  only  "as  nearly  as  the 
conditions  of  good  administration  will  vi'arrant."  It  is  significant  of  the 
consistent  purpose  of  the  framers  of  the  act  to  allow  to  the  President  the 
widest  discretion  possible  that  they  should  have  thought  it  appropriate  to 


92  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

observed  that  this  injunction,  hke  the  direct  statutory  prohi- 
bition just  cited,  appHes  only  to  removal  for  failure  to  make  a 
political  contribution  and  does  not  cover  removal  for  political 
reasons  generally.  From  the  beginning  the  rules  themselves, 
however,  have  gone  further  than  this;  and  the  present  rules 
provide  that :  "No  discrimination  shall  be  exercised,  threatened, 
or  promised  by  any  person  in  the  executive  civil  service  against 
or  in  favor  of  an  .  .  .  employee  because  of  his  political  or 
religious  opinions  or  affiliations;"-^  and  that  "in  making  re- 
movals ...  no  discrimination  shall  be  exercised  for  political 
or  religious  reasons."  - 

It  will  be  appreciated  that  these  latter  provisions,  like  those 
cited  with  reference  to  the  removal  of  the  members  of  the  sev- 
eral commissions  and  boards  by  the  President,  are  virtually 
unenforceable,  since  the  reason  for  which  a  person  is  removed 
or  dismissed  in  almost  all  cases  is  beyond  the  reach  of  any  court 
or  enforcing  tribunal ;  nor  indeed  has  any  method  of  enforce- 
ment been  provided  by  rules  other  than  investigation  by  the 
Civil  Service  Commission.  The  only  type  of  provisions  regard-, 
ing  removal  which  have  other  than  a  moral  effect  are  those 
providing  for  a  particular  formality  of  procedure  to  be  ob- 
served, or  authorizing  a  reviewing  body,  as  a  court,  to  pass 
final  judgment  as  to  whether  the  reason  alleged  by  the  remov- 
ing authority  in  pursuance  of  such  prescribed  procedure,  was 
actually  in  existence — the  latter  type  of  provision  in  effect  sub- 
jecting the  power  of  removal  to  the  veto  of  the  reviewing  body. 
Neither  type  of  provision  has  been  adopted  by  Congress  with 
reference  to  positions  outside  the  competitive  class. ^ 

Neither  in  the  presidential  positions  nor  in  the  non-presi- 
dential positions  outside  the  competitive  service  does  there  ex- 
ist any  effective  legal  limitation  on  the  power  to  remove  for 

embrace  so  ol)viously  universally  applicahlc  a  provision  as  this  (as  well  as 
the  remaining  three  of  the  eight  provisions)  in  the  general  qualification 
referred  to. 

'  Rule  I,  2. 

'Rule  XII,  2. 

*  In  1912  Congress  prescribed  a  procedure  for  removal  of  persons 
from  the  "Classified  Civil  Service,"  Init  this  act  has  been  construed  as 
applying  only  to  the  compctilivc  service. 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         93 

political  reasons ;  and  in  practice  the  injunctions  against  politi- 
cal removals  just  cited  are  virtually  a  dead  letter  as  regards 
not  a  few  non-presidential  positions.  In  certain  excepted 
classified  positions,  removals  are  regularly  made  for  political 
reasons,  and  no  attempt  is  made  by  the  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion to  prevent  them. 

With  respect  to  the  provisions  bearing  on  the  competitive 
service,  it  need  only  be  said  at  this  point  ^  that  they  require  that 
the  person  whose  removal  is  proposed  be  given  notice  in 
writing  of  the  reasons  for  which  such  removal  is  proposed,  and 
a  reasonable  time  (in  practice  not  less  than  three  days)  in  which 
to  answer  such  reasons  in  writing,  and  they  require  the  whole 
proceeding  to  be  made  of  record  in  the  department  and  in  the 
Civil  Service  Commission.  Even  with  respect  to  the  competi- 
tive classified  service,  therefore,  the  statute  furnishes  no  actual 
safeguard  against  removal  for  political  or  other  improper  mo- 
tives. The  real  protection  against  such  removal  in  the  com- 
petitive service  consists,  of  course,  in  the  absence  of  incentive 
under  ordinary  conditions  to  make  such  removal,  since  the 
successor  of  the  person  removed  cannot  be  selected  at  will  by 
the  removing  officer  but  must  be  taken  from  those  standing 
highest  in  the  eligible  register  prepared  by  the  Civil  Service 
Commission.  The  same  applies  with  greater  or  less  force  to 
all  the  other  branches  of  the  service  to  which  formal  methods 
of  selection  have  been  applied — the  consular  and  diplomatic 
services,  the  Public  Health  Service,  the  presidential  postmaster- 
ships,  the  unskilled  labor  service  in  the  cities  where  selection 
is  by  competition. 

On  the  other  hand,  where  selection  is  frankly  political,  any 
attempt  to  establish  by  law  a  legal  protection  against  political 
removal  (analogous  to  the  traditional  protection  enjoyed  by  the 
British  civil  servant  before  the  introduction  of  the  merit  sys- 
tem, above  mentioned)  would  be  putting  the  cart  before  the 
horse.  Such  a  law,  moreover,  if  at  all  observed,  would  saddle 
upon  the  service  an  employee  who  had  not  been  required  to 

*  These  provisions  are  set  out  more  fully  in  Chapter  XV. 


94  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

demonstrate  prior  to  appointment  any  qualification  for  the 
post. 

As  applied  then  to  positions  to  which  selection  is  by  formal 
methods,  legal  security  against  political  removal  is  largely 
superfluous;  as  applied  to  positions  filled  by  political  appoint- 
ment it  is  illogical.  Between  these  two  extremes  is  found  the 
class  of  positions  to  which  selection  is  wholly  in  the  discretion 
of  the  appointing  officer,  but  in  which  the  tradition  of  non- 
political  merit  selection  is  more  or  less  firmly  established.  It 
is  here  that  legal  provision  directed  against  removal  for  politi- 
cal reasons  may  be  of  value,  in  fortifying  and  sustaining  the 
tradition  of  merit  in  selection.  For  not  only  may  it  actually 
restrain  the  hand  of  the  administrative  officer  who  may  be 
tempted  to  remove  a  capable  incumbent  to  make  room  for  a 
political  successor,  but  it  may  make  it  easier  for  the  officer  who 
seeks  to  uphold  the  tradition  of  selection  for  merit  to  obtain  a 
capable  non-political  appointee.  Only  when  there  is  adequate 
assurance  against  removal  for  political  reasons  can  either  the 
non-political  permanent  personnel  or  qualified  non-political  out- 
siders be  induced  to  take  interest  in  securing  appointment  to  a 
position.  The  instances  are  numerous  where  the  attempt, 
made  in  good  faith  by  an  administrative  officer,  to  fill  a  given 
class  of  positions  on  a  merit  basis,  by  the  promotion  of  em- 
ployees from  permanent  positions,  has  failed  because  the 
employees  have  been  unwilling  to  take  the  risk  of  assuming 
positions  which  have  traditionally  been  regularly  vacated  for 
political  reasons. 

For  these  reasons,  it  seems  desirable  that  the  act  of  1912, 
requiring  a  formal  procedure  in  removal  from  the  classified 
competitive  service,  should  be  extended  to  embrace  also  all  non- 
competitive positions  and  all  excepted  positions,  whether  ex- 
cepted by  the  rules  or  by  special  statute.  It  is  true  that  certain 
of  these  excepted  positions  have  been  filled  by  political  ap- 
pointees; but  the  theory  of  the  rules  and  law  is  not  that  they 
should  be  so  filled,  and  even  if  such  an  extension  of  the  law  of 
1912  would  afiford  protection  at  the  present  time  to  a  certain 
portion  of  the  employees  in  these  classes  who  are  not  morally  or 


THE  LAW  OF  SELECTION  AND  TENURE         95 

in  theory  entitled  to  such  protection,  the  benefits  would  out- 
weigh this  drawback. 

The  extension  of  such  a  protection  to  those  "presidential" 
positions  to  which  selection  is  traditionally  based  on  merit 
presents  much  greater  difficulty.  Not  only  are  the  great  ma- 
jority of  the  positions  in  this  class  (aside  from  the  post- 
masters) frankly  political,  but  it  is  the  theory  of  the  law  that 
they  should  be  so,  and  to  attempt  in  any  degree  to  correct  the 
situation,  while  leaving  all  else  unchanged,  by  introducing  a 
legal  protection  against  political  removal,  would  be  futile. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  EXTENSION  OF  FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION 

In  the  preceding  chapter  the  various  laws  and  regulations 
designed  to  exclude  political  and  other  improper  considerations 
from  the  selection  and  removal  of  the  Federal  personnel  were 
reviewed.  In  the  present  chapter  the  attempt  will  be  made  to 
consider,  in  respect  to  those  posts  to  which  no  formal  method 
of  selection  has  been  applied,  the  extent  to  which  selection 
actually  is  or  should  be  controlled  by  politics,  and  where  such 
control  is  improper,  how  it  may  be  eliminated  best. 

By  confining  this  chapter  to  positions  to  which  no  formal 
methods  of  selection  have  been  applied,  it  is  not  intended  to 
imply  that  selection  in  the  remaining  areas  of  the  service,  where 
such  methods  have  been  applied,  is  entirely  free  from  politics. 
In  some  cases  this  is  doubtless  far  from  the  truth.  Neverthe- 
less, the  application  of  a  formal  system  of  selection  to  these 
positions  gives  full  legal  recognition  to  the  principle  of  merit, 
and  they  fall  clearly  outside  of  the  field  which  even  the  spoils- 
man may  regard  as  legitimate  area  for  political  appointment. 
If  in  this  area  the  merit  principle  is  in  fact  violated  for  politi- 
cal reasons,  what  is  needed  is  not  a  basic  reform  in  principle 
but  a  revision  in  the  details  of  the  present  practice.  In  the 
chapters  devoted  to  the  examination  of  these  formal  systems  of 
selection,  some  of  these  matters  are  discussed  in  detail.^ 

For  the  purposes  of  this  chapter  the  area  of  political  ap- 
pointment and  removal  can  most  conveniently  be  discussed  by 
considering  first  the  departments  at  Washington,  then  the  lo- 
cal offices  and  establishments,  and  finally  the  foreign  service. 
Heads  of  Departments  and  Independent  Establishments. — 
As  is  well  known  the  heads  of  departments  occupy  the  dual 

*  Sec  Chapters  IX  and  X. 

96 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  97 

role  of  administrators  and  political  advisors.  Viewed  as  ad- 
ministrators much  might  be  said  in  favor  of  their  selection 
purely  from  the  standpoint  of  capacity  and  the  grant  to  them 
of  permanency  of  tenure.  As  political  advisors  it  is,  how- 
ever, not  only  proper,  but  advisable,  that  they  shall  be  chosen 
by  each  President  from  his  political  party  and  with  reference 
to  general  political  considerations.  This  conflict  of  considera- 
tions is  met  under  the  British  political  system  by  certain  mem- 
bers of  the  ministry  having  positions  without  administrative 
portfolios  and  by  the  provision  of  permanent  undersecretaries 
who  have  immediate  charge  of  the  administration  of  the  sev- 
eral departments,  who  are  looked  upon  as  non-political  officers 
and  who  have  the  same  permanency  of  tenure  of  office  as  other 
administrative  officers.  There  is  no  reason  why  a  similar 
system  should  not  be  developed  in  this  country. 

The  position  of  heads  of  independent  establishments  and 
members  of  boards  or  committees  representing  the  directing 
personnel  of  such  establishments,  has,  however,  a  different 
status  in  that  such  officers  are  neither  members  of  the  Presi- 
dent's Cabinet,  nor  strictly  his  political  advisors.  Moreover,  in 
the  more  important  of  these  establishments  which  have  a  board 
or  commission  form  of  organization,  its  members,  with  the 
exception  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  are  appointed  for 
terms  of  years. 

The  terms  of  the  members  of  these  boards  are  so  arranged 
that  only  one  vacancy  will  arise  in  any  one  year  and  no  vacancy 
at  all  in  certain  years,  and  in  the  case  of  the  Federal  Reserve 
Board  a  vacancy  arises  but  once  every  two  years.  The  result 
is  that  while  the  President  selects  the  entire  personnel  of  his 
Cabinet,  he  selects  during  his  four-year  term  of  office  at  most 
but  four  of  the  five  members  of  the  Federal  Trade  Commis- 
sion, not  appointing  a  majority  until  his  third  year — and  may 
select  but  two;  he  selects  similarly  but  five  of  the  seven  mem- 
bers of  the  Shipping  Board  and  may  select  but  four ;  he  selects 
but  two  of  the  five  appointive  memljers  of  the  Federal  Reserve 
Board;  and  but  five  or  six  of  the  eleven  members  of  the  Inter- 
state Commerce  Commission. 


98  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

It  is  evident  from  these  provisions  that  the  law  constitutes 
that  these  positions  shall  be  viewed  as  non-political.  In  re- 
spect to  them  it  is  thus  desirable  that  permanency  of  tenure,  to 
be  secured  through  the  reappointment  of  members  at  the  ex- 
piration of  their  terms,  should  prevail,  except  where  it  is  clearly 
evident  that  the  public  interests  will  be  advanced  by  the  ap- 
pointment of  new  members. 

Assistant  Secretaries  and  Analogous  Officers. — In  each  of 
the  executive  departments  is  found  one  or  more  chief  assist- 
ants to  the  head  of  the  department,  variously  designated  as 
assistant  secretary,  undersecretary,  etc.  All  of  these  are  ap- 
pointed by  the  President  and  Senate,  except  in  the  cases  of 
the  assistant  secretaries  of  Commerce  and  of  Labor.  These 
latter  are  appointed  by  the  President  alone,  and  are  thus  in 
the  classified  service ;  their  positions,  however,  are  "excepted" 
under  a  general  provision  of  the  civil  service  rules,  excepting 
from  examination  all  positions  to  which  appointment  is  made 
by  the  President  alone. 

These  officers  are,  with  exceptions  so  rare  as  to  be  negligi- 
ble, political  appointees.  They  regularly  change  with  each 
change  of  administration.  To  this  rule  there  have  been  occa- 
sional exceptions.  One  of  the  assistant  secretaries  of  State 
has  been  retained  through  no  less  than  nine  administrations, 
covering  six  distinct  changes  in  the  political  party  in  power  in 
the  White  House,  and  a  few  cognate,  though  less  marked,  ex- 
ceptions may  be  found  in  the  history  of  other  departments. 
They  are,  however,  too  few  to  impair  the  truth  of  the  general 
statement  that  the  post  of  assistant  secretary  is  a  political  one. 

The  position  of  assistant  secretary  in  our  government  is 
thus  radically  different  from  that  of  the  undersecretary  in  the 
British  Government,  or  the  corresponding  departmental  officer 
in  continental  practice.  There  the  undersecretary  is  the  real 
administrative  head  of  the  department,  permanent  and  non- 
political  ;  he  conducts  the  actual  administration,  while  the  po- 
litical minister  or  the  secretary  concerns  himself  only  with  the 
larger  and  more  political  aspects  of  the  department's  business. 
With  us,  the  assistant  secretary,  being  as  much  a  political  ap- 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  99 

pointee  as  is  the  secretary,  is  in  no  wise  better  qualified  to  direct 
the  detailed  administration  of  the  department ;  and  he  thus  be- 
comes a  mere  administrative  assistant  to  the  secretary.  In  sev- 
eral of  the  departments,  notably  in  the  Treasury,  Justice,  and 
Post  Office  Departments,  there  are  several  assistant  secretaries, 
each  in  charge,  under  the  head  of  the  department,  of  a  certain 
part  of  the  department's  work. 

The  whole  institution  of  the  assistant  secretary,  as  now 
found  in  some  of  the  departments,  might  be  subjected  to  criti- 
cism from  the  standpoint  of  correct  organization;  for  the  pres- 
ent purpose,  however,  it  is  necessary  to  point  out  only  that 
whatever  the  validity  of  the  arguments  advanced  for  the  selec- 
tion of  the  secretaries  upon  a  political  and  personal  basis,  they 
have  no  application  whatever  to  the  positions  of  assistant  sec- 
retary. No  valid  reason  can  be  advanced  why  all  these  posi- 
tions should  not  be  filled  purely  on  a  merit  basis,  with  the 
permanence  of  tenure  which  that  basis  implies. 

The  barring  of  the  assistant  secretaryships  of  the  depart- 
ments to  the  permanent  personnel  is  particularly  unfortunate. 
It  is  a  type  of  position — one  of  the  few  classes  of  important 
positions — which  a  man  or  woman  of  native  intelligence,  ex- 
perienced in  governmental  business,  but  possessing  no  special 
technical  equipment,  is  peculiarly  able  to  fill.  It  is  a  goal  which, 
while  not  of  the  loftiest,  would  be  exceedingly  attractive  to  the 
experienced  clerk  or  minor  executive,  to  whom  the  headship 
of  a  bureau,  even  where  filled  by  merit,  is  barred  by  reason  of 
his  lack  of  technical  qualifications. 

The  steps  which  should  be  taken  to  place  the  position  of 
the  assistant  secretary  upon  a  non-political,  permanent  basis 
are  substantially  similar  to  those  called  for  in  the  case  of  the 
bureau  or  service  heads,  and  the  two  will  accordingly  be  dis- 
cussed together  after  the  facts  relative  to  bureau  heads  have 
been  reviewed. 

Heads  of  Bureaus  and  Services. — The  heads  of  the  several 
bureaus  and  services  constituting  the  major  primary  units  of 
organization  of  the  executive  departments,  with  comparatively 
few  exceptions,  are  appointed  by  the  President  and  confirmed 


loo  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

by  the  Senate.^  In  a  few  of  the  bureaus  there  are  found 
deputy  chiefs  or  assistant  directors.  Generally  speaking  these 
officers  are  appointed  in  the  same  way  as  are  their  principals.^ 

Few  of  the  independent  establishments  are  organized  in 
distinct  bureaus  or  services.  For  the  most  part  they  are  uni- 
functional  and  correspond  in  their  organization  to  a  single 
service  of  one  of  the  executive  departments,  rather  than  to 
the  department  itself. 

For  bureau  heads,  with  the  exception  of  five,^  the  law 
provides  an  indefinite  tenure,  but  despite  the  substantial 
uniformity  of  the  legal  provisions  which  thus  control  their 
appointment  and  tenure,  diverse  traditions  have  developed 
with  respect  to  the  several  offices.  Some  are  avowedly  held  to 
be  proper  fields  for  purely  political  appointments.  In  others, 
the  head  virtually  holds  during  good  behavior;  his  removal  by 
the  President'  for  purely  political  causes  would  be  deemed  a 
gross  abuse  of  power.  In  still  others  tradition  has  not  yet 
taken  permanent  form ;  a  removal  for  purely  political  reasons 
would  provoke  adverse  criticism  from  the  opposite  political 
party,  but  would  not  be  regarded  very  seriously. 

^  The  exceptions  are  the  Commissioner  of  Lighthouses,  who  is  ap- 
pointed by  the  President  alone;  the  Chief  of  the  Bureau  of  Investigation 
in  the  Department  of  Justice,  appointed  by  the  Attorney  General ;  the 
Director  of  the  Reclamation  Service,  and  the  Director  of  the  National 
Park  Service,  appointed  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior;  the  Supervis- 
mg  Architect  of  the  Treasury,  and  the  Director  of  the  Bureau  of  Engrav- 
ing and  Printing,  appointed  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury;  and  the 
heads  of  the  several  bureaus  of  the  Department  of  State  and  of  the 
Department  of  Agriculture  (other  than  the  Weather  Bureau)  who  are 
appointed  by  the  secretaries  of  those  departments. 

'  The  assistant  chiefs  of  bureau,  who  are  appointed  by  the  President 
by  and  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate  are:  Treasury  Depart- 
ment, assistant  treasurer  and  assistant  deputy  treasurer;  Bureau  of  In- 
ternal Revenue,  deputy  commissioners,  five ;  Assistant  Register  of  the 
Treasury;  Assistant  Commissioners  of  Patent  Office,  two;  Assistant  Com- 
missioner of  the  Office  of  Indian  Affairs ;  Assistant  Commissioner  of  the 
General  Land  Office;  Deputy  Commissioner  of  Pensions;  Deputy  Com- 
missioner of  Fisheries;  assistant  directors  of  the  Bureau  of  Foreign  and 
Domestic  Commerce,  two. 

"The  Comptroller  of  the  Currency  and  the  Director  of  the  Mint  are 
appointed  for  five  years,  the  Director  of  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey, 
tine  Commissioner  of  Labor  Statistics  and  tlie  Purchasing  Agent  of  the 
Post  Office  Department  arc  appointed  for  four  years.  In  the  case  of  the 
Director  of  the  Mint  and  the  Comptroller  of  the  Currency,  the  President  is 
required,  if  he  remove  tlicm,  to  communicate  his  reasons  to  the  Senate;  a 
provision  not  found  in  the  case  of  any  of  the  other  bureau  heads. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  loi 

While  it  is  difficult  to  classify  the  presidential  bureau  head- 
ships with  confidence  on  this  basis,  the  following  probably  rep- 
resents substantially  the  existing  situation: 

Purely  Political  Positions 

Department  of  the  Treasury 

Comptroller  of  the  Currency  ^ 

Treasurer 

Commissioner  of  Internal  Revenue 

Director  of  the  Mint  ^ 

Register  of  the  Treasury 
Department  of  the  Interior 

Commissioner,  General  Land  Office 

Commissioner  of  Indian  Affairs 

Commissioner  of  Pensions 

Commissioner  of  Patents 
Department  of  Labor 

Commissioner-General  of  Immigration 

Commissioner  of  Naturalization 
Independent  Establishment 

Alien  Property  Custodian  (appointed  by  President  alone) 

Positions  Held  During  Good  Behavior 

Department  of  the  Treasury 

Surgeon  General,  Public  Health  Service ' 

Captain  Commandant,  Coast  Guard ' 

Director  of  the  Budget 
Department  of  the  Interior 

Commissioner  of  Education 

Director  of  Geological  Survey 

Director  of  Bureau  of  Mines 
Department  of  Agriculture 

Chief  of  Weather  Bureau 
Department  of  Commerce 

Commissioner  of  Fisheries 

Director  of  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey ' 

Director  of  Bureau  of  Standards 

Commissioner  of  Lighthouses  (appointed  by  the  President  alone) 

Commissioner  of  Navigation 

Director  of  the  Census 

Director,  Bureau  of  Foreign  and  Domestic  Commerce 

Supervising  Inspector-General,  Steamboat  Inspection  Service 

*  It  is  notable  that  the  Comptroller  of  the  Currency  and  the  Director 
of  the  Mint,  who  by  law  enjoy  fixed  terms,  are  regularly  displaced  by  a 
change  of  administration. 

'  Appointed  for  four-year  term. 


I02  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Department  of  Labor 

Chief  of  Children's  Bureau 

Commissioner  of  Labor  Statistics  * 

Director  of  Women's  Bureau 
Independent  Establishments 

Chief  of  Bureau  of  Efficiency  (appointed  by  President  alone) 

Director  of  the  Veterans'  Bureau 

Comptroller  General ' 

It  will  thus  be  seen  that  of  the  33  "presidential"  bureau 
headships  listed,  12  are  rated  as  purely  political,  21  as  wholly 
non-political.  In  the  case  of  the  12  listed  as  purely  political, 
it  cannot  be  said  that  there  is  any  indication  of  a  tendency 
towards  the  development  of  a  tradition  of  permanence  of  non- 
political  character. 

The  offices  of  Comptroller  General  and  Assistant  Comp- 
troller General,  created  by  the  Budget  and  Accounting  Act 
approved  June  10,  192 1,  present  a  radical  departure  in  pro- 
cedure relative  to  tenure  and  power  of  removal.  These  officers 
are  appointed  for  a  term  of  15  years,  by  the  President,  by  and 
with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate.  The  law  provides 
that  these  officers  "may  be  removed  at  any  time  by  joint  reso- 
lution of  Congress  after  notice  and  hearing,  when,  in  the  judg- 
ment of  Congress,  the  Comptroller  General  or  Assistant 
Comptroller  General  has  become  permanently  incapacitated  or 
has  been  inefficient,  or  guilty  of  neglect  of  duty,  or  of  mal- 
feasance in  office,  or  of  any  felony  or  conduct  involving  moral 
turpitude,  and  for  no  other  cause  and  in  no  other  manner 
except  by  impeachment."  It  provides  also  that  the  former 
shall  not  be  eligible  for  reappointment  and  that  when 
either  of  the  officers  attains  the  age  of  seventy,  he  shall 
be  retired. 

These  unusual  provisions  depriving  the  President  of  the 
power  of  removal  are  due  to  the  fact  that  the  Comptroller 
General  is  in  effect  the  representative  of  Congress  in  auditing 
the  accounts  of  the  government  and  in  investigating  all  mat- 
ters relating  to  the  receipt,  disbursement,  and  application  of 

*  Appointed  for  four-year  term. 
'Appointed  for  fifteen-year  term. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  103 

public  funds.  In  order  to  make  these  officers  independent  of 
executive  pressure  the  power  of  removal  has  been  placed  in 
Congress  alone.  The  former  office  of  Comptroller  of  the 
Treasury  was  filled  by  appointment  by  the  President,  who  also 
had  the  power  of  removal  as  in  the  case  of  other  executive 
officers.  There  is  a  story  current  to  the  effect  that  one  Presi- 
dent was  displeased  with  the  decision  of  a  Comptroller,  and 
that  he  remarked  that  he  could  not  change  the  decisions  of 
the  Comptroller  but  that  he  could  change  the  Comptroller. 
Whether  this  story  is  true  or  not,  it  accurately  represents  the 
legal  relation  of  the  President  and  the  Comptroller  of  the 
Treasury  under  the  old  law.  In  the  case  of  the  new  office  of 
Comptroller  General  Congress  went  further  in  the  first  bill 
creating  that  office  and  provided  for  the  election  of  the  Comp- 
troller General  by  Congress.  This  bill  was  vetoed  by 
President  Wilson  on  the  ground  that  it  encroached  on  the 
constitutional  prerogative  of  the  President,  by  providing  for 
the  selection  of  an  officer  of  the  government  by  the  legislative 
branch.  The  present  law  meets  the  constitutional  objec- 
tion by  placing  the  appointment  of  this  officer  in  the  hands 
of  the  President,  but  it  also  removes  him  from  executive 
domination  by  placing  the  power  of  removal  in  the  hands  of 
Congress. 

There  are  several  lines  along  which  effort  to  secure  the 
extension  of  the  merit  principle  to  the  assistant  secretaryships 
and  to  the  bureau  and  service  headships  to  which  it  does  not  yet 
apply  may  be  directed.  The  obvious  and  direct  way — what 
might  be  termed  the  frontal  method  of  attack — consists  in  seek- 
ing the  abolition  in  respect  to  all  of  these  posts  of  the  advice 
and  consent  of  the  Senate,  thus  placing  them  within  the  scope 
of  the  civil  service  law.  Conjointly  with  this  legislation  it 
might  be  well  to  try  to  transfer  the  power  of  appointment  of 
assistant  secretaries  and  bureau  chiefs  from  the  President  to 
the  heads  of  the  several  departments.  There  has  come  to  be  a 
tradition  or  flavor  of  politics  about  presidential  appointments 
of  whatever  kind;  and  this  of  itself  constitutes  something  of  a 
hindrance  to  the  application  of  the  merit  principle  to  such 


I04  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

appointments,  however  sincerely  attempted.  The  investment 
of  the  several  secretaries  with  complete  power  of  appointment 
of  assistant  secretaries  and  bureau  or  service  chiefs,  would 
serve  to  emphasize  by  statutory  recognition,  the  purely  admin- 
istrative character  of  these  posts  and  the  impropriety  of  ad- 
mitting any  political  considerations  in  the  selection  of  their 
incumbents.-^ 

The  alternative  line  of  attack  is  to  attempt  to  secure  by 
Presidential  action  alone  the  application  of  the  merit  principle 
to  all  the  assistant  secretaryships  and  to  those  of  the  bureau 
and  service  headships  to  which  the  principle  has  not  yet  been 
applied. 

In  considering  the  relative  possibilities  offered  by  these  two 
methods,  it  must  always  be  remembered  that,  under  the  law 
of  1 87 1,  as  was  pointed  out  in  a  preceding  chapter,  the  Presi- 
dent has  by  statute,  quite  aside  from  and  in  addition  to  his 
constitutional  discretion,  as  full  and  complete  control  over  the 
selection  of  nominees  for  assistant  secretaryships  and  bureau 
headships  as  he  would  have  were  those  positions  placed  within 
the  scope  of  the  civil  service  law.  There  is  no  system  of  selec- 
tion or  regulation  which  he  might  apply  to  these  posts  if 
brought  under  the  civil  service  law  by  means  of  the  legislation 
above  outlined  which  may  not  with  equal  effect  be  applied  by 
him  under  existing  law.  The  sole  difference  will  be  that  in 
the  latter  case  the  confirmation  of  the  Senate  will  still  be  re- 
quired for  all  appointments  made  as  a  result  of  such  system  or 
regulation.  Another  point  of  difference  is  that  if  brought  un- 
der the  civil  service  law  and  selected  by  competitive  examina- 
tion or  by  promotion  from  employees  originally  so  selected, 
these  officers  would  enjoy  a  greater  nominal  protection  against 
removal.  It  is  not  believed,  however,  that  this  difference 
would  have  any  significance  in  the  case  of  the  posts  in  question. 

*  Another  detail  of  the  legislative  program  would  l)c  the  substitution  of 
indefinite  tenure  for  the  five-year  term  now  fixed  for  the  Comptroller  of 
the  Currency  and  the  Director  of  the  Mint.  While  indefinite  tenure  does 
not,  as  seen,  prevent  the  post  from  being  treated  as  a  political  one,  a  fixed 
term,  especially  so  short  a  one,  makes  it  almost  impossible  to  have  it  treated 
as  a  non-political  one. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  105 

Conversely,  even  if  the  legislation  outlined  were  enacted, 
the  cooperation  of  the  President  would  have  to  be  secured  to 
make  it  efifective ;  for  that  legislation,  it  should  be  remembered, 
would  not  insure  the  assistant  secretaries  and  heads  of  depart- 
ments entire  freedom  from  political  considerations,  for  the 
President  could  still  place  them  in  the  excepted  class  (as  he 
has  done  indeed  with  all  positions  to  which  appointment  is  by 
the  President  alone ).^  Indeed,  as  was  shown  in  the  discussion 
of  the  legal  bases  of  the  federal  personnel  system,  no  mere  legal 
change,  within  the  limits  of  existing  precedents,  would  insure 
the  application  of  the  merit  system,  except  through  the  co- 
operation of  the  President. 

Consequently,  the  chief  value  which  the  enactment  of  the 
legislation  suggested  might  have  would  not  be  in  the  change 
of  the  technical  legal  status  of  these  positions  but  rather  in 
the  moral  and  practical  effect  of  a  positive  declaration  by  Con- 
gress that  these  posts  ought  to  be  filled  solely  on  the  basis  of 
merit. 

In  any  case  the  radical  character  of  the  legislative  program 
outlined  renders  very  slim  the  chance  of  its  enactment  in  the 
near  future.  Since  the  enactment  of  the  civil  service  law  in 
1883,  Congress  has  seldom  taken  action  designed  to  extend  the 
merit  principle ;  ^  on  not  a  few  occasions  it  has  enacted  ex- 
ceptions to  the  civil  service  law  calculated  to  weaken  and  under- 
mine the  principle.  There  seems  little  reason  to  hope  for  con- 
gressional assistance  for  any  plan  designed  to  oust  the  spoils 
system  from  these,  its  traditional  strongholds. 

The  practicability  and  value  of  an  attempt  to  secure  from 

^  In  the  case  of  the  Assistant  Secretaries  of  Commerce  and  of  Labor 
the  statutes  already  vest  appointment  solely  in  the  hands  of  the  President, 
but  these  offices  have  been  treated  as  on  precisely  the  same  footing  as  the 
other  assistant  secretaryships.  Were  all  the  assistant  secretaryships  on 
the  statutory  basis,  however,  the  development  of  a  merit  tradition  would  be 
far  easier. 

"  The  only  instances  in  which  it  has  taken  such  action  are  the  act  of 
1889,  providing  for  non-competitive  examinations  for  entrance  and  promo- 
tion in  the  Public  Health  Service,  possibly  the  act  of  igo6,  arranging 
the  consular  service  in  grades  and  thereby  facilitating  the  application  of 
merit  methods  of  selection  to  that  service,  and  the  act  of  May  22,  1917, 
providing  for  appointments  of  certain  officers  in  the  Coast  and  Geodetic 
Survey. 


To6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

the  President  alone  tl  e  extension  of  the  merit  principle  to 
ihesc  posts  d'ipends  much  on  tlic  precise  nature  of  tlie  action 
Wiiicii  it  i'£  sought  to  have  thvii  President  taV.e.  On  th^  one 
hand,  it  might  merely  be  urged  upon  a  President,  particularl> 
an  incoming  President,  that  in  making  his  nominations  to  the 
positions  of  assistant  secretary  and  to  those  bureau  headships 
now  regarded  as  political  he  be  guided  solely  by  merit,  extend- 
ing to  these  posts  the  tradition  of  non-political  selection  already 
established  in  the  case  of  the  technical  bureau  headships.  The 
difficulty  with  this  line  of  action,  sound  as  is  its  aim,  is  that  it 
involves  no  procedural  or  legal  change  in  the  method  of  selec- 
tion which  may  serve  as  a  visible  sign,  and  subsequently  as  a 
touchstone,  of  the  actual  establishment  of  the  merit  principle. 
This  absence  of  concrete  evidence  that  the  merit  principle 
actually  governs  is  indeed  a  major  weakness  of  the  tradition 
of  merit  as  now  applied  to  the  headships  of  the  technical 
services.-^ 

On  the  other  hand,  the  attempt  to  secure  action  from  the 
President  may  take  for  its  program  the  promulgation  by  the 
President  of  regulations  prescribing  a  formal  procedure  by 
which  assistant  secretaries  and  bureau  heads  are  to  be  selected 
for  nomination.  It  is  believed  that,  almost  regardless  of  the 
contents  of  such  regulations,  their  promulgation  would  in 
efifect  place  these  posts  irrevocably  on  a  merit  basis ;  that  the 
"advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate"  would  become  as  to  these 
posts  a  mere  formality.  It  is  believed  consequently  that  this 
line  of  attack  is  to  be  preferred  to  the  legislative  attack;  that 
it  will  produce  substantially  equal  results,  and  that  it  presents 
less  difficulty  and  better  chances  of  success. 

'  A  case  in  point  arose  in  connection  with  the  appointment  in  1914  to 
the  position  of  Superintendent  of  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey.  The 
appointee  was  attacked  by  the  opposition  party  as  wholly  lacking  in  the 
necessary  technical  qualifications,  but  was  defended  by  the  administration 
as  possessing  in  marked  degree  the  type  of  lay  executive  ability  and  vigor 
particularly  demanded  at  the  time  by  the  administrative  problems  confront- 
ing the  service.  The  absence  of  any  formalities  in  the  procedure  of 
selection  which  insured  either  that  political  considerations  had  been  ex- 
cluded or  that  the  President  had  acted  upon  non-political,  technical  advice 
made  it  impossible  for  an  interested  public  to  form  any  clear  idea  of  the 
extent  to  which  the  appointment  had  actually  been  dictated  by  the  needs 
of  the  service. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  107 

The  most  desirable  and  effective  feature  which  should  be  in- 
corporated in  those  regulations  (a  feature  which,  as  pointed 
out  in  a  subsequent  chapter,  does  not  now  have  place  in  the  civil 
service  rules)  would  be  a  clear  declaration  of  the  principle  that 
selection  from  these  posts  would  be  made  from  within  the 
classified  service,  except  where  the  President  expressly  certi- 
fied that  such  selection  would  not  be  in  the  best  interests  of 
the  service.  To  this  end  the  regulations  might  provide  that  on  a 
vacancy  occurring  in  any  of  these  positions  the  head  of  the 
department  should  submit  to  the  President  the  names  of  these 
persons  in  the  service  suitable  for  promotion  to  such  vacancy, 
with  recommendations ;  or,  in  the  event  of  there  being  no  per- 
son deemed  suitable,  the  names  of  the  persons  naturally  in  line 
for  the  position,  with  the  reasons  why  they  are  regarded  as 
unsuitable. 

The  adoption  of  this  principle  would  be  the  most  desir- 
able method  of  abolishing  purely  political  appointments  not 
only  because  it  represents  the  soundest  practice  on  all  general 
counts  of  selection  from  within,  but  because  it  would  escape 
the  difficult  problem  of  applying  to  those  higher  posts  any  for- 
mal method  of  selection  from  outside  the  service.  It  needs  no 
argument  that  the  rigid  procedure  in  selection  now  applied  by 
the  Civil  Service  Commission  to  the  ordinary  competitive  posts 
is  not  applicable  to  these  posts ;  and  in  a  subsequent  chapter 
possible  modifications  of  that  procedure  to  make  it  suitable  to 
these  posts  is  discussed.  Nevertheless,  despite  such  modifica- 
tions, the  filling  of  these  posts  from  without  the  service  by  a 
method  that  will  command  public  confidence  must  always  re- 
main difficult  and  should  be  resorted  to  only  when  indisputably 
demanded  by  the  good  of  the  service.^ 

In  one  case  such  provision  has  been  written  into  the  law — 
that  of  the  Director  of  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey.^  For 
many  years  this  officer  had  been  appointed  by  the  President, 
by  and  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate  without  legal 

*  See  Chapter  XI. 

'Designation  changed  from  Superintendent  to  Director  by  Act  of 
June  5,  1920  (41  Stat.  929). 


io8  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

restrictions,  but  the  act  of  June  4,  1920  (41  Stat.,  825)  pro- 
vides that  "he  shall  be  appointed  by  the  President,  by  and  with 
the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate  from  the  list  of  com- 
missioned officers  of  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  not  below 
the  rank  of  commander  for  a  term  of  four  years,  and  may  be 
reappointed  for  further  periods  of  four  years  each."  For  the 
fiscal  year  1922  provision  is  made  for  nine  officers,  exclusive 
of  the  director,  of  the  rank  of  commander  and  higher. 

The  regulations  of  the  Public  Health  Service  provide  that 
the  Surgeon  General  shall  be  selected  from  the  commissioned 
medical  officers  of  the  Service  above  the  grade  of  passed 
assistant  surgeon.  As  these  regulations  are  promulgated  by 
the  President  he  can  amend  or  ignore  them.  This  regulation 
is  evidently  based  on  the  act  of  January  4,  1889  (25  Stat. 
639),  which  provides  that  no  person  shall  be  appointed  a  medi- 
cal officer  of  the  service  until  after  he  has  passed  an  examina- 
tion and  that  appointment  shall  be  made  only  to  the  lowest 
grade  in  the  service— that  of  assistant  surgeon.  No  mention 
is  made  in  this  act  of  the  Surgeon  General  whose  appointment 
is  provided  for  by  the  act  of  March  3,  1875  (18  Stat.  371, 
377).  In  191 1,  however,  the  Acting  Attorney  General  held 
that  the  "law  does  not  restrict  the  President  in  selecting  a 
surgeon  general  of  the  Public  Health  and  Marine  Hospital 
Service  to  the  list  of  commissioned  officers  in  the  medical 
corps  of  the  service."  ^  The  essential  parts  of  the  opinion  of 
the  Attorney  General  are  as  follows : 

There  was  at  that  time  [January  4,  1889]  no  specific  pro- 
vision of  law  at  all  for  the  appointment  or  promotion  of  any 
officer  in  that  service  except  the  Supervising  Surgeon  General. 
By  the  act  of  March  3,  1875  (18  Stat.  371,  377)  the  latter 
officer  was  to  be  appointed  by  the  President,  by  and  with  the 
advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate;  and  the  class  from  which  he 
should  be  selected  was  not  restricted  in  any  respect.  The 
appointment  and  promotion  of  the  medical  officers,  as  dis- 
tinguished from  the  Supervising  Surgeon  General,  were 
governed  merely  by  the  Regulations  of  the  Marine  Hospital 

'29  Op.  Att.  Gen.,  pp.  287-293. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  109 

Service  for  1879,  according  to  which  the  "medical  officers"  in 
the  "service"  were  to  be  appointed  by  the  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury,  upon  the  recommendation  of  the  Supervising  Sur- 
geon General  (par,  23).  .  .  . 

The  regulations  evidently  made  a  clear-cut  distinction  be- 
tween the  Supervising  Surgeon  General — who  is  appointed 
by  the  President  from  any  class  of  surgeons  and  is  not  neces- 
sarily selected  from  the  service  nor  subject  to  an  examination 
— and  the  "medical  officers"  who  are  not  regularly  commis- 
sioned who,  after  an  original  appointment  to  the  grade  of 
assistant  surgeon,  are  promoted  from  that  grade  to  the  grade 
of  surgeon  by  regular  steps. 

This  preexisting,  well-established  distinction  between  the 
Supervising  Surgeon  General  and  "the  medical  officers"  as  to 
the  mode  of  appointment  and  promotion  is  vital  to  a  correct 
construction  of  the  act  of  1889,  because  it  appears  that  that 
act  was  passed  entirely  at  the  instance  of  the  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury,  and  of  the  Supervising  Surgeons  General  of  the 
Marine  Hospital  Service,  in  order  to  put  into  the  form  of 
specific  provisions  of  law  the  regulations  of  1879. 

It  thus  seems  clear  that  the  general  purpose  of  the  act  of 
1889  was  not  to  change  the  method  of  appointing  the  Super- 
vising Surgeon  General,  nor  to  disturb  the  distinction  recog- 
nized by  the  regulations  of  1879  between  that  officer  and  the 
"medical  officers"  of  the  service,  but  merely  to  legalize  the 
position  of  the  latter,  to  raise  them  to  the  grade  of  regularly 
commissioned  officers,  and  to  fix  in  the  law  the  regulations  as 
to  their  promotion. 

Since  this  opinion  was  rendered  there  has  been  no  legisla- 
tion affecting  the  conclusions  in  one  direction  or  another.  As 
a  matter  of  fact  all  the  Surgeons  General  of  the  Public  Health 
Service,  with  the  exception  of  the  first  one,  appointed  in  1871, 
have  been  selected  from  the  commissioned  medical  officers  of 
the  service. 

As  has  been  indicated,  were  the  merit  principle  given  formal 
recognition  in  the  case  of  these  posts  by  either  the  setting  up 
of  formal  methods  of  selection  or  the  limitation  of  selection 
to  those  already  in  the  service,  it  would  become  a  matter  of 
small  importance  whether  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Sen- 
ate persisted  or  not.    It  is  well  established  that  where  the  merit 


no  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

principle  has  received  formal  recognition  in  the  selection  of 
nominees  to  "presidential"  positions,  as  it  has  in  the  case  of 
consuls,  diplomatic  secretaries,  commissioned  officers  of  the 
Public  Health  Service  and  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey, 
and  "presidential"  postmasterships — in  all  except  the  Public 
Health  Service  and  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey,  moreover, 
the  system  of  selection  having  been  set  up  solely  by  order  of 
the  President,  independently  of  statute — the  confirmation  of 
the  Senate  has  become  a  perfunctory  matter,  just  as  it  has  in 
all  ordinary  cases,  in  the  selection  of  army  and  navy  officers. 
The  abolition  of  the  advice  and  the  consent  of  the  Senate  for 
these  posts,  which  was  proposed  as  an  item  in  a  possible  legis- 
lative program  under  this  head,  would  be  of  value  chiefly  as 
evidencing  the  recognition  of  the  merit  principle  by  Congress. 
Were  that  principle  established  by  either  of  the  other  methods 
mentioned  (the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate  still  persist- 
ing), there  would  be  but  little  to  be  gained  by  an  abolition  of 
the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate,  wholly  desirable  as  such 
a  step  would  be  merely  in  principle. 

Other  Superior  Personnel  at  Washington. — The  superior 
personnel  at  Washington  below  the  rank  of  chief  or  assistant 
chief  of  a  bureau  includes  but  few  "Presidential"  positions, 
aside  from  the  commissioned  officers  of  the  Public  Health 
Service  and  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  to  whose  special 
legal  position  attention  has  already  been  called.^ 

Solicitors  of  tlw  Depart Jiictits. — The  chief  group  of  such 
subordinate  "presidential"  officers  is  made  up  of  departmental  ^ 
"solicitors."  The  solicitors  for  the  Post  Office  and  Navy 
Departments  are  appointed  by  the  heads  of  departments  and 
there  is  no  reason  why  solicitors  for  other  departments  should 
he  "presidential"  appointees.  In  fact  the  corresponding  offi- 
cers of  the  independent  establishments  are  not  so  appointed. 

'The  staff  of  the  Hygienic  Lalioratory  conducted  by  the  Public  Health 
Service  and  other  scientific  employees  arc  in  a  large  part  in  the  com- 
petitive service,  their  positions  not  being  regarded  as  those  of  "medical 
officers"  of  the  Pul>lic  Health  Service. 

'  There  is  also  a  solicitor  for  the  Bureau  of  Internal  Revenue  who 
falls  in  the  same  class. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  iii 

Because  of  their  small  number,  however,  it  will  be  next  to  im- 
possible to  secure  the  application  of  formal  methods  to  their 
selection,  as  long  as  they  remain  in  the  presidential  class.  The 
abolition  of  the  "presidential"  status  of  these  officers,  and  their 
appointment  by  the  heads  of  the  several  departments,  is  an 
item  in  the  program  of  federal  i^ersonnel  reform  whose  pro- 
priety is  hardly  open  to  argument.-^ 

Atufitors  of  the  Departments. — The  same  is  true  of  the  six 
auditors  of  the  Departments.  Their  duties  are  wholly  admin- 
istrative, and  long  familiarity  with  government  practice  is  in- 
dispensable to  efficiency  in  these  posts.  Unquestionably  the 
method  of  "presidential"  appointment,  which  has  resulted  in 
the  changing  of  the  personnel  of  these  posts  with  almost  every 
changing  administration,  has  failed  to  give  satisfaction. 

As  long  ago  as  1910  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  recom- 
mended that,  instead  of  the  President  and  Senate,  he  be  given 
the  power  to  appoint  these  officers ;  "  and  in  the  budget  act, 
which  establishes  the  office  of  Comptroller  General,  they  are 
abolished  altogether.  That  act,  however,  provides  that  the 
duties  of  the  Auditor  for  the  Post-Office  Department  shall  be 
performed  by  the  Comptroller  of  the  Bureau  of  Accounts  of 
the  Post-Office  Department,  who  is  appointed  by  the  President, 
by  and  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate. 

Chief  Examiner  of  the  Civil  Service  Conimission. — A 
presidential  appointee  who  stands  somewhat  in  a  diss  by  him- 
self is  the  Chief  Examiner  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission. 
The  law  does  not  expressly  require  that  he  be  appointed  by 
the  President  and  confirmed  by  the  Senate,  but,  as  it  makes  no 
other  provision  for  such  appointment,  it  has  been  held  that, 

_  *  In  1912  there  was  some  discussion  in  the  departments  of  the  desira- 
bility of  placing  the  position  of  solicitor  on  a  merit  basis  by  taking  it  out 
of  the  presidential  class,  but  no  action  was  taken  (see  Thirtieth  Report  of 
the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission  (1912),  p.  10).  Doubtless  the 
suspicion  which  would  have  attached  to  such  action  at  that  time,  of  its 
being  an  attempt  to  "cover  in"  the  then  political  incumbents — a  difficulty 
always  found  in  attempts  to  convert  positions  from  a  spoils  to  a  merit 
basis,  but  particularly  so  when  an  election  is  impending — may  have  had 
something  to  do  with  this. 

*  Annual  Report  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  for  the  year  ended 
June  30,  1910,  p.  13. 


112  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

since  the  chief  examiner  is  an  officer,  he  is  to  be  appointed  by 
the  President  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate.^ 

This  anomalous  position  of  the  Chief  Examiner  is  not 
based  on  reason.  He  is  a  technical  advisor  and  officer  of  the 
Commission,  and  if  appointment  to  any  position  in  the  service 
should  be  utterly  removed  from  any  possibility  of  political  con- 
sideration, it  should  be  his.  In  point  of  fact  no  suggestion  has 
ever  been  made  that  any  of  the  chief  examiners  have  been  ap- 
pointed on  any  considerations  other  than  their  merit.  Never- 
theless, the  present  method  of  appointment  not  only  deprives 
the  position  of  such  protection  against  removal  as  is  afforded 
classified,  competitive  positions,  namely,  the  requirement  of 
charges,  opportunity  to  answer,  etc.,  but  it  carries  with  it  the 
possibility  that  at  some  future  time  the  appointment  of  a  chief 
examiner  may  be  affected,  in  a  measure,  by  political  considera- 
tions. The  point  is  well  illustrated  by  the  fact  that,  on  the 
forced  resignation  in  1919  of  one  of  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
missioners, he  made  a  public  statement  to  the  effect  that  "a 
short  time  ago  the  Commission  unanimously  recommended  that 
the  President  appoint  as  Chief  Examiner  an  employee  of  the 
Commission  who  is  far  better  qualified  for  this  position  than 
any  other  person  of  whom  the  Commission  has  knowledge,  but 
the  Postmaster  General  desired  that  the  position  be  filled  by 
another  person  of  his  own  selection."  Were  appointment 
vested  completely  in  the  hands  of  the  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion, and  were  that  Commission,  as  elsewhere  urged,  com- 
pletely removed  from  the  possibility  of  pressure  by  the  ad- 
ministration, the  selection  of  the  Chief  Examiner  of  the  Com- 
mission could  not  be  affected  by  any  such  considerations  as 
have  been  suggested. 

The  remaining  presidential  appointees  at  Washington  -  are 
of  minor  importance,  though  in  each  case  they  are  purely  ad- 

*  Opinion  of  the  Attorney  General,  May  26,  1886.  18  Op.,  4.  11. 

'These  officers  are:  the  purchasing  agent  of  the  Post  Office  Depart- 
ment, the  examiners-in-chief  of  the  Patent  Office,  and  the  recorder  of  the 
General  Land  Office.  In  any  general  revision  of  the  law  they  should  un- 
doubtedly be  placed  in  the  classified  service.  The  tradition  of  merit 
appointment  of  the  examiners-in-chief  of  the  Patent  Office  now  appears  to 
be  well  established. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  113 

ministrative  officers  and  no  justification  exists  for  their  political 
appointment,  which  is  now  the  general  though  not  invariable 
rule,  and  the  danger  of  which  is  in  any  case  always  present. 

Smithsonian  Institution  and  National  Home  for  Dis- 
abled Volunteer  Soldiers. — The  appointment  of  the  execu- 
tive heads  of  the  Smithsonian  Institution  and  of  the  National 
Home  for  Disabled  Volunteer  Soldiers  differs  from  that  of 
any  other  executive  offices  of  the  government  in  that  it  is 
vested  in  boards  composed  in  part  oi  ex  officio  members  and 
in  part  of  members  elected  by  Congress.  The  Secretary  of 
the  Smithsonian  Institution  is  elected  by  the  Board  of  Regents, 
which  is  composed  of  the  Vice  President,  the  Chief  Justice, 
three  members  of  the  Senate  appointed  by  the  President  of 
the  Senate,  three  members  of  the  House  of  Representatives, 
appointed  by  the  Speaker,  and  six  other  persons  elected  by 
joint  resolution  of  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives. 
Of  the  six  members  elected  by  joint  resolution  two  must  be 
residents  of  the  District  of  Columbia;  no  two  of  the  remain- 
ing four  can  be  elected  from  the  same  state.  Members  of 
the  House  of  Representatives  serve  for  two  years,  members 
of  the  Senate  during  the  term  for  which  they  hold  without 
reelection  their  office  as  Senators.  The  term  of  office  of  the 
elected  members  is  six  years. 

The  Board  of  Managers  of  the  National  Home  for  Dis- 
abled Volunteer  Soldiers  consists  of  the  President,  the  Secre- 
tary of  War,  the  Chief  Justice  and  seven  members  elected  by 
joint  resolution  of  Congress.  The  Managers  elect  from  their 
own  number  a  president  who  is  the  chief  executive  officer  of 
the  board.  This  organization,  however,  is  a  field  service  and 
ha^no  personnel  in  Washington. 

Subordinate  Personnel  at  Washington. — With  the  excep- 
tion of  the  few  presidential  positions  which  have  just  been 
reviewed  all  positions  at  Washington  below  the  grade  of  bureau 
head  or  assistant  chief  are  appointed  by  the  head  of  the  de- 
partment or  establishment.  All  these  positions  above  the  labor 
class  are,  therefore,  in  the  competitive  classified  service  unless 
specifically  excepted  by  statute  or  by  civil  service  rule. 


114  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Legal  Employees. — The  most  important  group  of  "classi- 
fied" positions  in  Washington  now  exempted  from  competi- 
tion by  the  civil  service  rules  is  the  legal  service,  centering 
particularly,  of  course,  in  the  Department  of  Justice.     The 
political  appointment  of  several  departmental  solicitors,  who 
are  the  chief  legal  officers  outside  the  Department  of  Justice, 
has  already  been  mentioned.     These  officers  are  presidential 
appointees.     By  the  civil  service  rules,  however,  substantially 
all  the  remaining  legal  positions  in  the  Government,  except  in 
the  lowest  grade,   that  known   as   "law  clerk,"   are  also  ex- 
cepted from  competition.    By  the  rules  all  "attorneys,  assistant 
attorneys,  and  special  assistant  attorneys"  in  all  departments 
are  excepted  from  competition  (Schedule  A  of  the  Civil  Service 
Rules,  I,  4).     In  the  Dep  irtment  of  Justice  all  "examiners" 
and  "all  positions  and  appointments  deemed  by  the  Attorney 
General   to   be   legal   in   their   character   and   which   relate   to 
temporary  service  or  which  grow  out  of  appropriation  acts 
committing  to  the  Attorney  General  the  execution  of  some  pur- 
pose of  the  law  and  the  expenditure  of  funds  therefor  but  not 
creating  specific  positions,"  are  also  excepted  (Schedule  A  of 
the  Civil  Service  Rules,  VI,  3,   5).     In  addition,  there  are 
various  other  exceptions  under  the  several  departments,  which 
in  some  cases  might  seem  to  be  covered  by  the  general  excep- 
tion of  all  attorneys,  assistant  attorneys,  and  special  assistant 
attorneys,  but  which  apparently  have  been   specifically  listed 
out  of  an  abundance  of  caution.^     Finally  under  the  statutory 
exceptions  to  competition,   extended   to   nearly   all   the   inde- 
pendent boards  and  comm.issioners  in  respect  to  their  technical 
personnel,  the  legal  em])loyees  of  these  bodies  are  generally 
appointed  without  competition. 

The  net  result,  as  already  stated,  is  that  substantially  the 
whole  legal  'service  above  the  lowest  grade  is  excepted  from 
competition  except  where  the  head  of  the  service  has  chosen 

'These  exceptions  are  as  follows:  one  law  officer  in  the  Bureau  of 
Insular  Affairs,  War  Department:  officers  to  aid  in  important  draft  wofk, 
and  assistant  solicitors  in  the  Department  of  State ;  and  the  chief  law 
officer  of  the  Reclamation  Service. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  115 

to  organize  the  legal  vpositions  on  a  competitive  basis  by  giv- 
ing to  them  titles  which  would  take  them  out  of  the  exceptions 
provided  by  the  rules. ^  These  positions  are  filled  sometimes 
purely  on  political  grounds ;  sometimes  purely  on  the  score  of 
merit  (as  was  the  case  when  the  Department  of  Justice  some 
years  ago  conducted  an  examination,  more  or  less  competitive, 
for  fifling  vacancies  in  the  lowest  grade,  that  of  assistant  at- 
torney) and  sometimes  by  a  combination  of  both  considera- 
tions. Occasionally  an  employee  who  has  entered  by  the 
competitive  route  and  has  served  as  law  clerk  is  promoted; 
and  in  a  few  instances  such  employees  have  risen  very  high  in 
the  service.  The  whole  system  is  thus  such  a  compound  of 
political  considerations  and  merit  that  historical  research  would 
be  necessary  to  determine  the  factors  actually  behind  the  se- 
lection of  any  particular  individual.  The  extent  to  which  re- 
movals are  made  for  political  reasons  is  again  similarly 
irregular. 

That  no  sufficient  reason  exists  for  the  continuance  of  this 
situation  in  the  legal  service  is  obvious.  That  service  is  purely 
technical.  Only  technical  excellence  is  required  of  its  mem- 
bers. The  whole  service  should  be  placed  squarely  upon  a  basis 
of  merit.  The  political  tinge  which  the  legal  service  of  the 
government  now  has  is  no  more  appropriate  to  it  than  would 
a  similar  tinge  be  to  the  engineering  or  the  medical  service. 
The  recommendation  for  the  competitive  classification  of  all 
positions  of  attorney  and  assistant  attorney  now  excepted  has 
had  the  endorsement  of  at  least  one  of  the  attorneys-general, 
Charles  J.   Bonaparte."    The  absurdity   of   the   current   situa- 

'  TIius  in  the  expansion  of  the  Internal  Revenue  Bureau,  as  the  result 
of  the  war  revenue  acts,  the  need  arose  for  a  large  expansion  of  the  legal 
force  of  that  bureau.  A  large  number  of  appointments  to  this  bureau  were 
recently  made  under  the  title  of  "Special  assistant,  legal  unit,"  and  are 
consequently  made  by  competitive  examination.  Had  the  Commissioner  of 
Internal  Revenue  chosen  to  designate  these  positions  "attorney"  or  "as- 
sistant attorney"  they  would  have  been  excepted  from  examination. 

^Annual  report  of  the  Attorney  General,  1912,  p.  8.  The  entire  state- 
ment of  Mr.  Bonaparte  merits  reproduction.  "With  a  view  to  the  estab- 
lishment of  a  merit  system  for  the  appointment  of  attorneys  and  assistant 
attorneys  in  the  department  similar  to  that  governing  the  classified  civil 
service,  during  the  last  fiscal  year  I  made  the  experiment  of  filling  two  or 
three  positions  in  the  following  manner: 


ii6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

tion  in  this  level  of  the  legal  service  is  emphasized  by  the  fact 
that  certain  of  the  positions  of  law  clerk — a  competitive  classi- 
fied position — enjoy  a  salary  as  high  as  $3,000  while  certain 
of  the  assistant  attorneys  who  are  in  the  excepted  class  receive 
only  $2,500. 

Employees  of  Certain  Boards  and  Commissions. — A 
second  major  class  of  positions  in  the  federal  service  at  Wash- 
ington that  may  be  filled  through  political  influence  are  those 
placed  outside  the  provisions  of  the  civil  service  law  by  special 
statute.  These  embrace  all  the  employees  of  the  Federal  Re- 
serve Board  and  of  the  Federal  Farm  Loan  Board  and  the  secre- 
taries, technical  and  "expert''  employees  of  the  Federal  Trade 
Commission,  the  Shipping  Board,  the  Veterans'  Bureau, 
and  the  Tariff  Commission.  It  is  perhaps  true  that  the  em- 
ployees selected  by  these  bodies  under  the  authority  of  these 
statutes  without  reference  to  the  civil  service  law  or  rules,  and 
indeed  without  any   formalized  system  of   selection   in  most 

Applications  were  invited  from  all  aspirants  to  appointment,  especially 
from  the  younger  graduates  of  the  leading  law  schools ;  the  territory  se- 
lected for  the  experiment  being  that  within  reasonable  reach  of  Washing- 
ton. Notwithstanding  this  limitation  of  the  field,  and  the  short  time  given 
for  advertisement,  65  candidates  presented  themselves,  among  them  a  con- 
siderable number  of  the  most  promising  of  the  recent  graduates  of  law 
schools. 

Their  qualifications  were  carefully  investigated  by  a  committee  con- 
sisting of  two  attorneys  of  this  department  familiar  with  the  particular 
duties  attached  to  the  positions  to  be  filled,  and  two  officers  of  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  (the  chief  examiner  and  the  law  examiner)  detailed 
by  the  courtesy  of  that  commission  to  cooperate  in  the  experiment.  This 
committee  held  no  formal  written  examination,  but  investigated  the  records 
of  the  applicants,  corresponded  with  the  persons  to  whom  they  had  re- 
ferred, studied  samples  of  legal  briefs  and  law  memoranda  previously 
written  by  them,  and  held  personal  conferences  with  such  as  were  found 
to  be  most  promising.  As  a  result  of  this  investigation,  the  comniittee 
submitted  to  me  the  names  of  the  four  applicants  who  they  considered 
best  suited  to  meet  the  requirements  of  the  vacant  positions.  I  appointed 
the  first  two  on  this  list,  one  of  tliem  a  recent  graduate  of  high  standing 
of  the  Harvard  Law  School  and  the  other  a  recent  graduate  of  like  high 
standing  of  the  Columbia  Law  School.  I  have  recently  filled  another  minor 
attorneyship  by  appointing  the  third  of  the  four  applicants  so  selected  and 
recommended. 

These  appointees  have  proved  so  satisfactory  in  their  departmental 
work  as  to  convince  me  that  such  a  method  of  selection  is  not  only  prac- 
ticable and  convenient,  but  that  it  would  greatly  strengthen  the  legal  force 
of  the  department.  .       ,      .        , 

I  therefore  recommend  the  adoption  of  this  method  of  selecting  the 
attorneys  and  assistant  attorneys,  as  a  permanent  policy,  by  the  classifying 
of  these  positions  as  competitive  under  the  civil  service  rules." 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  117 

cases,  are  in  most  cases  as  competent  and  capable  as  any  who 
would  have  been  selected  through  the  ordinary  competitive 
methods.  Nevertheless  the  absence  of  those  methods  furnishes 
an  opening  for  the  entrance  of  political  considerations ;  and 
here  and  there  they  do  enter  unquestionably.  The  abuse  is  minor, 
but  it  is  still  an  abuse  and  it  has  always  latent  in  it  large 
powers  of  growth  should  a  different  tradition  develop  in  any 
of  these  bodies.  Moreover,  even  when  the  employee  selected 
is  wholly  competent  and  has  been  selected  perhaps  wholly  with- 
out reference  to  political  considerations,  the  fact  that  there  has 
been  no  open  competition  or  even  invitation  of  applications 
with  respect  to  the  position  throws  an  atmosphere  of  doubt  and 
suspicion  over  the  whole  proceeding.  By  so  much  it  weakens 
the  morale  of  the  personnel  as  a  whole  and  in  particular  of 
those  employees  in  the  competitive  classified  service  who  would 
be  eligible  for  transfer  or  promotion  to  the  positions  thus  in- 
formally filled  were  they  on  the  regular  competitive  classified 
basis. 

Private  Secretaries  and  Confidential  Clerks. — Another 
group  of  positions  in  Washington,  much  smaller  than  either  of 
those  already  covered,  in  the  selection  for  which  politics  plays 
a  greater  or  less  part,  is  that  of  so-called  private  secretaries 
or  confidential  clerks  to  the  heads  of  departments  and  bureaus, 
who  are  excepted  by  the  civil  service  rules.  ^  Unimportant 
numerically  as  this  group  of  positions  is,  the  opportunity  af- 

*The  rule  provided  for  the  exception  in  all  executive  departments  of 
two  private  secretaries  or  confidential  clerks  to  the  head  of  the  department 
and  in  addition  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior  has  an  "assistant"  who  is 
excepted.  The  rules  also  provide  for  "one  private  secretary"  or  "confiden- 
tial clerk"  to  each  of  the  heads  of  bureaus  appointed  by  the  President  in 
the  executive  departments,  though  it  is  not  apparent  why  the  fact  that 
the  bureau  head  is  appointed  by  the  President  rather  than  by  the  head  of 
a  department  should  make  any  difference  in  respect  to  the  need  for  a 
"private  secretary"  or  "confidential  clerk."  Similarly,  the  purchasing 
agent  of  the  Post  Office  Department  is  allowed  an  excepted  private  secre- 
tary by  the  rules,  apparently  for  no  better  reason  than  he,  too,  is  a  presi- 
dential appointee.  Private  secretaries  are  also  allowed  to  the  Public 
Printer  and  to  the  Chief  of  the  Bureau  of  Efficiency.  The  provision  of 
excepted  private  secretaries  to  the  heads  of  the  several  independent  estab- 
lishments other  than  the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission  and  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  is  effected  by  the  use  of  the  statutory  exception  from 
competition  applicable  to  those  bodies. 


ii8  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

forded  for  the  entrance  of  political  considerations  is  a  viola- 
tion of  principle  and  should  be  eliminated  by  placing  these  posi- 
tions in  the  competitive  classified  service.  These  positions 
are,  of  course,  no  more  confidential  than  a  host  of  other  posi- 
tions which  are  in  the  competitive  classified  service.  The  in- 
clusion of  the  positions  under  discussion  in  that  service  need 
not  limit  materially  the  ability  of  the  head  of  the  department 
or  bureau  to  select  a  secretary  personally  acceptable  as  the  large 
number  of  available  employees  in  the  department  or  bureau 
among  w^hom  selection  may  be  made  offers  an  ample  opportun- 
ity under  this  head. 

Cognate  to  the  positions  of  private  secretary,  secretary,  and 
confidential  clerk  are  those  of  "confidential  inspectors"  and 
"special  agents."  These  are  nov^  found  only  in  the  Depart- 
ment of  the  Interior  and  in  the  Department  of  Justice.  In  the 
Department  of  the  Interior  exception  is  made  of  "inspectors 
whose  duties  are  of  a  confidential  nature"  in  the  office  of  the 
Secretary  and  of  the  six  "special  agents"  in  the  General  Land 
Office  to  investigate  fraudulent  entries  and  other  matters  of 
a  criminal  nature  (Schedule  A,  VII,  ii);  while  in  the  De- 
partment of  Justice  all  operatives  of  the  so-called  Division  of 
Investigation  are  excepted  under  the  general  exception  above 
cited  in  connection  with  the  legal  service  of  "positions  and 
appointments  deemed  by  the  Attorney  General  to  be  .  .  .  con- 
fidential in  their  character  and  which  relate  to  temporary 
service,  or  which  grow  out  of  appropriation  acts  committing 
to  the  Attorney  General  the  execution  of  some  purpose  of  the 
law  and  the  expenditure  of  the  funds  therefor  but  not  creat- 
ing specific  positions,"  all  of  the  funds  for  this  division  being 
regularly  appropriated  in  this  manner. 

The  position  of  "detective"  or  "operative"  is  not  indeed 
one  which  at  first  blush  seems  readily  susceptible  of  being 
filled  by  competitive  examination,  and  indeed  it  is  of  all  posi- 
tions one  to  the  application  of  which  the  competitive  method 
is  perhaps  least  appropriate.  Nevertheless,  it  docs  not  follow 
that  positions  of  this  character  cannot  be  filled  other  than  by 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  119 

designation  of  persons  outside  the  service.  In  a  service  as 
large  as  the  federal  service  it  is  always  possible  to  find  within 
the  competitive  service  a  sufficient  number  of  persons  capable 
of  filling  positions  of  this  character  to  complete  satisfaction. 

In  this  connection  it  is  not  without  interest  that  the  entire 
detective  force  of  the  New  York  Police  Department,  admittedly 
one  of  the  most  efficient  detective  forces  in  the  world,  is  en- 
tirely recruited  by  the  detail  to  the  detective  bureau  of  patrol- 
men who  show  aptitude  for  the  work.  Yet  the  original  ex- 
amination by  which  patrolmen  are  secured  is  solely  directed  to 
ascertaining  the  physical  qualifications  of  the  candidate  and  his 
possession  of  even  less  than  the  somewhat  limited  scholastic  ac- 
quirements supposed  to  result  from  a  common  school  education. 
That  it  would  be  possible  to  recruit  an  equally  efficient  force 
from  among  the  large  and  varied  range  of  the  federal  service 
can  hardly  be  questioned. 

Even  if,  as  is  perhaps  substantially  the  case  at  the  present 
time  in  the  Department  of  Justice,  the  force  is  selected  in  fact 
for  the  most  part  on  a  merit  basis,  its  removal  from  the  ex- 
cepted class  is  particularly  desirable.  The  absence  of  any  for- 
mal requirement  of  merit  or  any  formal  system  of  selection 
opens  wide  the  door  for  political  influence  and  occasionally,  if 
not  more  frequently,  a  political  appointment  is  bound  to  be 
made.  Yet  the  service  is  one  which  it  is  obviously  peculiarly 
desirable  to  keep  entirely  divorced  from  politics. 

The  remaining  exceptions  to  competition  in  the  depart- 
mental service  are  of  a  special  character  which  hardly  warrant 
discussion,  though  in  practically  no  case  is  there  any  good 
reason  why  exception  should  be  made.^ 

^  These  positions  are :  one  specialist  in  higher  education  in  the  Bureau 
of  Education  (See  Schedule  A,  VIII,  24)  ;  one  inspecting  engineer  and 
inspectors  in  the  purchasing  department  of  the  Panama  Canal  (Schedule  A, 
X,  2)  ;  and  the  director  of  the  valuation  division  in  the  Interstate  Com- 
merce Commission  and  his  chief  assistants,  two ;  five  experts  to  be  mem- 
bers of  an  advisory  board;  five  persons  of  a  board  of  engineers;  one 
supervisor  of  land  appraisals;  and  one  chief  accountant  (Schedule  A,  XII, 
I,  5).  This  list,  of  course,  does  not  include  a  few  minor  officers,  the 
reason  for  the  exception  of  which  is  that  they  involve  only  temporary  or 
occasional  service  or  that  the  salary  is  too  low  to  secure  competition. 
These  have  all  been  mentioned  in  the  preceding  chapter. 


I20  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

With  the  exceptions  just  reviewed  all  the  positions  at  Wash- 
ington below  that  of  chief  or  assistant  chief  of  a  bureau  are 
on  a  competitive  basis/  those  above  the  grade  of  laborer  l^eing 
in  the  classified  competitive  service  and  those  of  that  grade 
being  embraced  in  the  competitive  labor  regulations  of  No- 
vember 15,  1904. 

Field  Service;  Chief  Officers. — Passing  to  the  field  service, 
it  should  be  noted  first  that  the  field  organizations  maintained 
for  the  purposes  of  research  and  survey  by  the  several  scientific 
bureaus  of  the  government  are  treated,  from  the  standpoint 
of  appointment,  in  the  same  way  as  are  the  personnel  perma- 
nently located  in  Washington.  The  officers  in  charge  of  local 
offices  and  stations  in  one  of  thc^e  services,  like  the  officers  of 
corresponding  rank  and  responsibility  in  the  service  at  Wash- 
ington, are,  therefore,  in  the  competitive  service.  In  the  perma- 
nent local  offices  and  establishments  the  chief  officers  are  in 
most  cases  appointed  by  the  President  with  the  advice  and 
consent  of  the  Senate.  There  are,  however,  important  excep- 
tions to  this  rule.  It  will  be  well  for  purposes  of  future  ref- 
erence to  list  here  all  the  classes  of  local  establishments  and 
offices  of  the  government  and  the  titles  of  their  chief  officers, 
grouping  them  accordingly  as  the  appointment  of  such  chief  of- 
ficers rests  with  the  President  and  Senate  or  with  the  head  of  de- 
partment. 

I.     Chief  Local  Officers  Appointed  by  President  with  Advice 
AND  Consent  of  the  Senate 
Treasury  Department 
Mints 

Assay  Service — Superintendents,  Assayers,  Melters  and  Re- 
finers, Coiners 
Internal  Revenue  Service — Collectors 
Customs  Service — Collectors,  Naval  Officers,  Appraisers 
Department  of  Justice 
District  Attorneys 
Marshals 
Department  of  the  Interior 
Public  Lands  Service — Registers,  Receivers,  Surveyors  Gen- 
eral 

*A  few  positions  are  on  a  non-competitive  basis. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  121 

Department  of  Commerce 

Steamboat  Inspection  Service — Supervising  Inspectors 
Post  Office  Department 

First,   Second,  and  Third  Class  Postmasters '^ 
Department  of  Labor 

Immigration  Service — Commissioners  of  Immigration 
II.     Chief  Local  Officers  Appointed  by  the  Heads  of  Depart- 
ments: 
Treasury  Department 

Office   of   Comptroller  of   Currency — Chief   National   Bank 
Examiners 
Department  of  Justice 

Wardens  of  Penitentiaries 
Post  Office  Department 

Fourth-class  Postmasters  ^ 
Department  of  the  Interior 

Reclamation  Service — Project  Managers 

Indian  Service — Superintendent  of  Schools  and  Reservations 

National  Park  Service — Superintendents 
Department  of  Agriculture  ; 

Forest   Service — Foresters    (in   charge   of  the   several    for- 
ests) 
Department  of  Commerce 

Shipping  Commissioners 
Department  of  Labor 

Naturalization  Service — Chief  Examiners 
Civil  Service  Commission 

Secretaries  of  District  Offices 

General  Conditions. — The  total  lack  of  principle  which 
characterizes  this  classification  of  the  local  officers  with  re- 
spect to  their  method  of  appointment  is  explainable  largely  on 
historical  grounds.  Most  of  the  services  in  which  the  appoint- 
ment of  local  offices  is  by  the  President  subject  to  confirmation 
by  the  Senate  run  back  many  decades ;  while  those  in  which 
appointment  is  by  the  head  of  department  are,  in  almost  every 
case,  of  comparatively  recent  origin.  The  appointment  of 
local  officers  by  the  President  and  the  Senate  is  thus  a  venerable 

*  Many  of  the  second  and  all  of  the  third  class  postmasters  are  not  in 
any  real  sense  "officers"  at  all,  being  in  fact  merely  clerks  in  charge  of 
small  offices.  They  are  included  here,  however,  because  it  has  been  cus- 
tomary to  treat  them  in  law  in  the  same  manner  as  the  postmasters  in 
charge  of  the  post  offices  in  the  large  cities. 

*  As  explained  in  connection  with  the  preceding  list,  fourth  class  posl- 
niasters  are  not,  properly  considered,  "officers," 


122  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

historic  institution,  which  Congress  itself  now  tends  to  aban- 
don or  at  least  to  keep  within  its  present  lin-nts. 

It  should  further  be  said  that  the  newer  services  in  ques- 
tion are  in  nearly  every  case  technical  in  character,  while  the 
long  established  services  are  administrative,  that  is,  charged 
with  the  enforcement  of  law.  The  distinction  is  by  no  means 
so  clear  cut  or  so  consistently  adhered  to  that  any  justification 
of  the  difference  in  appointing  method  could  properly  be  based 
upon  it. 

With  the  exception  of  the  eleven  supervising  inspectors  of 
the  Steamboat  Inspection  Service  and  of  certain  classes  of 
vacancies  in  the  position  of  postmaster,  the  "presidential"  po- 
sitions in  question  are  filled  invariably  on  political  grounds,  and 
are  invariably  vacated  on  or  before  the  expiration  of  the 
statutory  term  if  there  has  been  a  change  of  administration.^ 
As  is  common  knowledge,  nominations  to  these  positions  in 
reality  are  normally  made  in  the  first  instance  not  by  the 
President,  but  by  the  Senators  of  the  state  in  which  the 
vacancy  exists,  where  those  Senators  are  of  the  same  political 
party  as  the  President;  and  by  the  party  leaders  of  the  Presi- 
dent's party  in  the  State,  should  the  Senators  from  the  state 
in  question  be  of  the  opposing  political  faith.-  The  appointees 
are  almost  without  exception  persons  who  have  rendered  politi- 
cal service  to  their  party;  only  in  the  rarest  cases  have  they 
been  selected  from  within  the  service,  and    when  so  selected 

'  In  1907  the  Civil  Service  Commission  stated  that  "the  average  tenure 
of  collector  of  customs  and  other  presidential  officers  is  gradually  increas- 
ing," and  it  regarded  this  as  "probalily  due  to  the  policy  of  reappointing 
efficient  incumlients"  (Twenty-seventh  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil 
Service  Commission  (1907),  p.  3).  Since  at  the  time  the  Commission 
wrote  the  Repul)]ican  party  had  been  in  office  continuously  for  ten  years, 
whereas  during  the  twelve  years  immediately  preceding  1.^97  neither  party 
had  been  in  power  longer  tlian  four  years  at  one  time,  the  question  arises 
whether  the  "gradual  increase"  in  the  tenure  of  presidential  officers  ob- 
servable in  1907  was  ever  "probably"  due  to  "the  policy  of  reappointing 
efficient  incumlicnts."  At  any  rate  a  computation  made  in  1917,  for  exam- 
ple, after  the  Democratic  party  had  been  in  office  four  years,  would  have 
shown  an  astounding  and  liy  no  means  gradual  decrease  in  the  average 
tenure  of  presidential  officers. 

^  Occasionally,  a  Senator  or  party  leader,  fearful  of  offending  local 
sentiment  Ijy  the  recommendation  of  the  candidate  of  one  rather  than 
another  of  the  contending  hical  factions,  has  held  a  popular  election  to 
obtain  the  consensus  of  local  preference. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  123 

it  has  been  only  when  their  poHtical  activity  has  been  con- 
spicuous.^ 

In  all  the  list  of  local  "presidential"  officers,  there  is  none 
which  could  not  be  filled  with  thorough  satisfaction  on  a  wholly 
non-political  basis  of  merit.  In  no  single  one  of  the  cases 
listed  do  the  requirements  of  good  administration  call  for  any 
exception  whatever  to  the  normal  processes  of  competition. 
The  removal  of  these  positions,  without  exception,  from  the 
influence  of  politics  and  personal  favoritism  would  improve  the 
administration  of  the  service  and  would  exert  a  powerful  influ- 
ence for  good  on  the  political  life  of  the  country.  Apart  from 
the  question  of  securing  more  competent  officers  the  difficulty  of 
recruiting  and  retaining  a  capable  subordinate  personnel,  when 
no  opportunity  exists  for  advancement  to  the  principal  posi- 
tions, is  obvious  and  well-recognized;  and  it  has  greater  im- 
portance in  connection  with  the  smaller  local  offices  where 
even  the  chief  position  is  within  striking  distance  of  the  average 
employee,  than  it  has  in  the  large  departmental  and  bureau 
organizations  at  Washington,  Of  the  political  evils  which  re- 
sult from  this  political  selection  of  the  heads  of  the  local  offices, 
it  is  unnecessary  here  to  speak.  All  the  well  worn  and  well 
proved  contentions  of  the  civil  service  reformer  have  their  full 
application  here.  The  complete  removal  of  all  local  federal 
offices  from  partisan  control  would  exert  a  powerful  cleansing 
effect  upon  the  machinery  of  both  the  major  political  parties. 

The  Four-year  Term:  Its  History  and  Disadvantages. — 
The  four-year  term  is  an  institution  which  has  served  power- 
fully to  fortify  the  system  of  political  selection  of  local  officers 
and  to  make  difficult  any  reform  in  the  direction  of  placing 
these  posts  upon  a  basis  of  merit.  The  tradition  of  the  four- 
year  term  for  local  officers  goes  back  to  the  very  beginning 
of  the  government.  In  the  original  judiciary  act  it  was  pro- 
vided -  that  marshals  should  be  api)ointed  for  a  four-year  term. 

^The  increasing  severity  of  the  civil  service  rules  aimed  at  political 
activity  on  the  part  of  classified  employees  has  now  made  it  virtually 
impossihle  for  such  an  employee  to  render  the  political  service"  necessary 
to  entitle  him  to  presidential  appointment. 

^Act  of  September  24,  1789. 


124  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

For  over  a  quarter  of  a  century  these  remained,  however,  the 
only  local  officers  of  the  United  States  having  a  definite  term, 
but  in  1820  it  was  enacted  that  the  several  collectors  and  sur- 
veyors of  customs,  the  so-called  naval  officers  at  the  several 
custom  houses,  the  district  attorneys,  and  the  registers  and 
receivers  of  land  offices  should  likewise  hold  for  a  four-year 
term.  In  1851,  the  same  principle  was  applied  to  the  offices 
of  Indian  agent  and  Indian  superintendent;  but  when  the 
office  of  Collector  of  Internal  Revenue  was  established  in 
1862,  no  fixed  term  was  provided.  While  this  may  have  re- 
flected at  the  time  a  disposition  on  the  part  of  Congress  to 
abandon  the  fixed  term  for  local  officers,  such  an  attitude  did 
not  long  persist.  In  1872  postmasters  who  had  hitherto  been 
appointed  in  every  case  for  an  indefinite  term  were  classified 
into  four  classes,  and  all  except  those  in  the  lowest  class,  that 
is  all  where  office  receipts  amounted  to  as  much  as  $1,900,  were 
thereafter  to  be  appointed  for  four  years.  This  was  the  most 
sweeping  and  the  most  indefensible  extension  of  the  four-year 
term  ever  made  by  Congress.  It  was  followed  by  one  other 
extension — that  of  1894  providing  a  four-year  term  for  the 
commissioners  of  immigration  at  the  several  ports.  At  the 
present  time,  therefore,  the  only  important  local  presidential 
officers  who  do  not  hold  for  a  four-year  term  are  the  collectors 
of  internal  revenue. 

Clearly,  no  lasting  progress  can  be  made  towards  putting 
these  local  offices  upon  a  basis  of  merit  until  the  fixed  term  is 
abolished.  Even  if  a  merit  system  of  selection  be  set  up  for 
appointment  to  these  positions,  their  character  as  permanent, 
non-political  posts  will  never  become  irrevocalMy  established 
so  long  as  their  incumbents  are  required  to  seek  reappointment, 
or  even  to  face  the  possibility  of  non-renewal  of  appointment, 
every  four  years.  The  abolition  of  the  four-year  term  of  local 
officers,  even  if  unaccompanied  by  any  change  in  the  method 
of  their  selection,  is  thus  an  important  item  in  the  immediate 
legislative  program  of  personnel  reform. 

Action  Required  to  Put  Field  Service  on  a  Merit  Basis. — 
With  the  four-year  term  abolished,  the  way  would  be  clear  for 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  125 

a  complete  conversion  of  these  local  offices  to  a  merit  basis. 
Such  a  change  could  be  made,  as  in  the  case  of  other  "presi- 
dential" offices,  solely  by  executive  order.  Reliance  on  mere 
executive  order,  rather  than  on  statutory  classification  is,  in 
the  case  of  local  officers,  open  to  several  minor  objections  w^hich 
do  not  exist  in  the  case  of  the  heads  of  bureaus  and  the  assist- 
ant secretaries.  In  the  first  place,  in  legislation  regarding 
personnel,  distinction  is  naturally  made  in  numerous  cases  be- 
tween those  employees  who  are  subject  to  the  civil  service  law 
and  those  not  so  subject.  If  local  officers  are  to  be  in  reality 
under  the  merit  system,  they  should  obviously  be  included  in 
legislation  intended  to  apply  to  the  employees  under  that  sys- 
tem. Perhaps  the  most  serious  objection  to  the  introduction  of 
the  merit  system  in  local  offices  merely  by  means  of  executive 
order  is,  however,  that  it  will  not  enlist  public  confidence  in 
the  same  degree  that  will  outright  classification  under  the  civil 
service  law. 

The  legislative  program  for  the  placing  of  local  officers 
upon  a  merit  basis  should  also  embrace  the  abolition  of  the  local 
residence  requirement  which  now  obtains  in  the  case  of  col- 
lectors of  internal  revenue  ^  and  postmasters.-  These,  contrary 
to  popular  impression,  are  the  only  local  offices  for  which  local 
residence  is  required  by  law.  In  all  other  local  offices,  it  is 
tradition  alone  which  demands  that  appointment  be  restricted 
to  local  residents.  This  tradition,  of  course,  is  closely  bound 
up  with  the  system  of  political  appointment  to  these  offices, 
and  no  doubt  will  readily  be  broken  down,  so  far  as  adminis- 
trative needs  make  it  desirable,  once  selection  by  merit,  and 
more  particularly  promotion  from  within  the  service,  has  estab- 
lished itself. 

The  legislative  program  here  urged  was  first  brought 
before  Congress  officially  by  President  Taft.  In  a  message 
to  Congress  in  191  o  he  urged  that  all  local  officers  be  placed 
upon  a  merit  basis,  through  the  abolition  of  the  four-year  term, 

'  Revised  Statutes,  Sec.  3142. 
'Revised  Statutes,  Sec.  3831. 


126  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

where  it  exists,  and  of  senatorial  confirmation;  and  this  rec- 
ommendation lie  reiterated  in  his  messages  of  191 1  and  1912. 
In  line  with  these  recommendations  bills  were  at  the  time  in- 
troduced into  Congress,  but  neither  the  messages  nor  the  bills 
received  much  attention;  and  during  the  administration  of 
President  Wilson  the  whole  question  may  be  said  to  have 
dropped  from  sight,  except  as  regards  the  presidential  post- 
masterships.  Bills  providing  for  the  abolition  of  senatorial 
consent  for  these  latter  positions  were  introduced  in  Congress 
in  1916,  and  in  191 7  a  provision  to  this  effect,  embodied  in 
the  legislative,  executive,  and  judicial  appropriation  bill  passed 
the  Senate  but  failed  in  conference.^ 

The  only  recent  official  mention  of  the  general  matter  aside 
from  the  annually  repeated  recommendations  of  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  appears  in  the  report  made  in  191 8  by  the 
Tariff  Commission  to  the  Committee  on  Ways  and  Means  on 
the  revision  of  the  laws  governing  the  administration  of  the 
customs.  In  this  report  the  Commission  urges  that  collectors 
of  customs  be  placed  under  the  provisions  of  the  civil  service 
law  through  the  substitution  of  appointment  by  the  Secretary 
of  the  Treasury  for  appointment  by  the  President  with  the 
confirmation  by  the  Senate. - 

Movement  for  Placing  Postal  Sendee  on  Merit  Basis. — 
The  action  of  President  Wilson  in  placing  presidential  post- 
masterships,  except  as  to  vacancies  occurring  by  expiration  of 
the  statutory  term,  upon  a  competitive  merit  basis  marks  the 
most  important  step  in  a  development  which  has  been  proceed- 
ing steadily  since  the  enactment  of  the  Civil  Service  law  in  the 
direction  of  lifting  the  postal  service  out  of  politics.  As  will 
be  recalled  the  civil  service  act  itself  provided  (Section  6, 
Second)  that  the  Postmaster-General  should  "arrange  in 
classes  the  several  clerks  and  persons  employed,  or  in  the  pub- 
lic service,  at  each  post  office,  or  under  any  postmaster  of  the 
United  States,  where  the  whole  number  of  said  clerks  and 

'  Sec  Good  Govcrtinicnt,  vol.  34,  p.  21. 

^  CAiriously  enough,  the  Commission  at  the  same  time  recommends, 
not  the  abolition  of  the  four-year  term  but  its  extension  to  six  years. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  127 

persons  shall  together  amount  to  as  many  as  fifty.  And  there- 
after, from  time  to  time,  on  the  direction  of  the  President,  it 
shall  be  the  duty  of  the  Postmaster-General  to  arrange  in  like 
classes  the  clerks  and  persons  so  employed  in  the  Postal  Service 
in  connection  with  any  other  post  office."  Pursuant  to  this 
authority,  the  subordinate  personnel  of  all  offices  of  the  first 
and  second  class  were  for  the  most  part  soon  brought  within 
the  classified  competitive  service.^  The  employees  of  offices  not 
having  free  delivery,  and  one  assistant  postmaster  (or  chief 
assistant  tO'  the  postmaster  of  whatever  designation)  at  each 
office  still  remained,  however,  in  the  excepted  class.  By  order 
of  President  Taft,  on  September  30,  19 10,  these  exceptions 
were  abolished  and  the  competitive  basis  extended  to  virtually 
the  whole  of  the  personnel  of  the  postal  service,  other  than 
postmasters  to  which  it  is  practicable  to  apply  competitive 
methods.- 

It  is  worthy  of  note  that  even  before  the  inclusion  of  the 
position  of  assistant  postmaster  in  the  competitive  service  the 
exigencies  of  the  business  at  many  of  the  larger  stations  had 
resulted  in  the  promotion  of  competitive  employees  to  that  po- 
sition. Of  the  1,504  offices  whose  personnel  was  in  the  com- 
petitive service  at  the  time  the  order  placing  assistant  post- 
masters in  that  service  went  into  effect,  348  had  assistant 
postmasters  who  had  thus  been  promoted  from  the  competitive 
service.  It  is  also  worthy  of  note  that  despite  this  plain  demon- 
stration of  the  impracticability  of  the  political  appointment  of 
assistant  postmasters  in  the  larger  offices,  not  to  speak  of  its 
impropriety  for  any  office,  an  attempt  was  made  in  Congress 
a  few  years  later  to  override  the  President's  order  and  to  ex- 
cept assistant  postmasters  from  classification  by  statute.^ 

Meanwhile,  in  1908,  a  beginning  had  been  made  in  the  ex- 
tension of  competitive  selection  to  the  postmasters  themselves, 

^  The  subordinate  personnel  of  the  third  and  fourth  class  offices  (the 
annual  receipts  of  which  do  not  exceed  $8,000)  and  on  star  routes  re- 
mained excepted,  and  owing  to  ihe  part-time  nature  of  their  service  they 
still  remain  so. 

^  The  auditor  of  the  post  office  at  New  York  City  is  still  in  the  excepted 
class,  without  apparent  reason. 

^  See  Good  Government,  vol.  31,  p.  25. 


128  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

The  system  of  selection  of  thousands  of  postmasters  had  re- 
mained unaffected  by  the  passage  of  the  civil  service  act.  The 
postmasters  of  the  fourth  class,  that  is  those  having  total  re- 
ceipts of  less  than  $1,900,  and  an  annual  salary  of  less  than 
$1,000,  were  appointed  by  the  Postmaster-General  and  they 
had  from  the  beginning  been  "classified"  in  the  excepted  class, 
but  those  of  the  third,  second,  and  first  class,  that  is  "presi- 
dential postmasters,"  were  entirely  outside  the  provisions  of 
the  law. 

The  evils  of  the  political  appointment  of  these  tens  of 
thousands  of  humble  officers  had  repeatedly  been  pointed  out  by 
the  Postmaster-General  as  well  as  by  the  civil  service  reformers. 
It  was  not,  however,  until  1908  that  any  action  was  taken. 
On  November  30  of  that  year.  President  Roosevelt,  by  amend- 
ment of  the  civil  service  rules,  transferred  from  the  exempt 
to  the  competitive  class  all  those  fourth  class  postmasters — 
15,488  in  number — in  the  14  states  north  of  the  Ohio  and  east 
of  the  Mississippi  rivers.  After  several  years  of  experimenta- 
tion by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  and  the  Post  Office  De- 
partment in  the  methods  of  filling  the  vacancies  in  these  posi- 
tions as  they  arose,  an  order  was  issued  by  President  Taft 
(on  October  15,  1912)  extending  the  classification  to  include 
all  the  states  (but  not  Alaska,  Hawaii,  or  Porto  Rico).  Under 
the  plan  of  classification  effected  by  these  orders  of  President 
Roosevelt  and  President  Taft,  all  incumbents  serving  on  the 
dates  of  the  orders,  however,  were  treated  as  brought  within 
the  classified  service  without  examination.  To  this  method 
of  "covering  in"  political  appointees  President  Wilson  appears 
to  have  taken  exception,  and  on  May  7,  1913,  he  amended  the 
order  of  his  predecessors  so  as  to  provide  that  no  fourth  class 
postmaster  should  be  given  a  competitive  classified  status  un- 
less and  until  he  had  been  appointed  as  a  result  of  open  com- 
petitive examination  (or,  in  the  case  of  the  smallest  offices, 
after  selection  and  inspection  by  a  representative  of  the  Post 
Office  Department)  ;  and  he  ordered  that  examinations  or  in- 
spections accordingly  be  conducted  for  all  offices  where  the 
then  incumbent  has  not  been  so  appointed.     This  order  placed 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  129 

upon  the  Civil  Service  Commission  the  responsibihty  of  pro- 
ceeding with  examinations  and  inspections  covering  17,318 
offices,  and  upon  the  Post  Office  Department  the  responsibihty 
for  inspections  at  17,936  offices. 

With  the  precise  methods  used  in  the  discharge  of  their 
responsibihties  we  are  not  here  concerned ;  nor  will  it  be  of 
value  here  to  enter  into  discussion  of  the  propriety  of  the  action 
of  the  Postmaster-General  in  submitting  to  the  Congressman 
of  the  appropriate  district  the  names  of  those  certified  by  the 
Civil  Service  Commission,  with  a  request  for  his  opinion  of  the 
candidates  "not  as  a  member  of  any  political  party  but  solely  as 
the  representative  of  the  community  regardless  of  political 
affiliations."  ^  The  Civil  Service  Commission  stated  in  its 
annual  report  for  the  fiscal  year  191 6  after  virtually  all  of  the 
work  of  appointment  under  the  new  regulations  had  been  com- 
pleted, that  it  was  "satisfied  that  the  great  majority  of  the  ap- 
pointments were  made  in  the  interest  of  the  service,"  and  the 
available  evidence  seems  to  justify  this  statement.  For  the 
present  purpose,  however,  all  this  is  of  secondary  importance. 
What  is  important  is  that  the  order  of  1913  and  the  examina- 
tions and  inspections  of  191 3-6  extended  to  every  fourth  class 
postmaster  in  the  United  States,  the  security  of  tenure  contem- 
plated by  the  civil  service  law,  and  fourth  class  postmasterships 
passed  definitely  and  permanently  out  of  the  class  of  political 
appointments. 

The  failure  of  the  efforts  of  President  Taft  to  secure  the 
"classification"  of  presidential  postmasters  (as  well  as  of  other 
presidential  local  officers)  and  the  failure  of  subsequent  at- 
tempts in  Congress  have  already  been  mentioned.  Even  as  late 
as  February,  19 17,  it  doubtless  would  have  been  said  by  most 
that  success  in  this  direction  was  still  some  distance  off.  On 
March  31,  191 7,  however,  President  Wilson  issued  an  execu- 
tive order  providing  that  all  vacancies  in  first,  second,  or  third 
class  postmasterships  thereafter  occurring  by  death,  resigna- 

*A  full  official  account  of  the  methods  of  examination  and  inspection 
of  employees,  and  of  the  action  of  the  Postmaster  General  referred  to, 
will  be  found  in  the  Thirty-third  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service 
Commission,  pp.  xi-xx,  xxv-xxvi. 


I30  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

tion,  or  removal,  should  be  filled  by  open  competitive  examina- 
tion, the  person  rated  highest  to  be  appointed  "unless  it  is 
established  that  the  character  or  residence  of  such  applicant 
disqualifies  him  for  appointment."  The  order  also  provided 
that  the  same  procedure  may  be  followed  where  no  vacancy 
exists  but  there  is  a  "recommendation  of  the  First  Assistant 
Postmaster-General,  approved  by  the  Postmaster-General,  to 
the  effect  that  the  efficiency  or  needs  of  the  service  requires 
that  a  change  should  be  made."  The  actual  procedure  provided 
is  that  the  Civil  Service  Commission  shall  hold  the  examination, 
and  "certify  the  result  thereof  to  the  Postmaster-General  who 
shall  submit  to  the  President  the  name  of  the  highest  qualified 
eligible  for  appointment  to  fill  such  vacancy,  unless  it  is  estab- 
lished that  the  character  or  residence  of  such  applicant  disquali- 
fies him  for  appointment."  After  receiving  the  name  submitted 
by  the  Postmaster-General  the  President,  of  course,  if  he 
chooses,  may  reject  it,  and  submit  the  name  of  one  lower  on 
the  list,  or  indeed,  of  anyone  he  chooses,  to  the  Senate;  but 
such  action,  of  course,  would  be  justified  only  on  the  strongest 
and  most  unusual  grounds,  and  has  not  yet  ensued  in  any  single 
case.  Nor  has  the  Senate  in  any  case  yet  declined  to  confirm 
the  nomination  of  a  postmaster  selected  under  this  procedure. 
The  order,  it  will  be  noted,  has  no  application  to  vacancies 
arising  through  the  expiration  of  the  four-year  terms  of  post- 
masters. No  official  explanation  of  the  reasons  for  this  major 
exception  has  ever  been  issued.  The  Postmaster-General  has 
stated  several  times  that  the  policy  of  the  administration  is  to 
reappoint,  at  the  expiration  of  their  four-year  terms,  those 
postmasters  whose  efficiency  warrants  it.  Where  a  reappoint- 
ment is  thus  made,  of  course,  no  examination  is  called  for.  It 
is  difficult  to  understand,  however,  wdiy  the  principle  of  the 
order  should  not  be  applied  to  those  numerous  instances  in 
which,  upon  the  expiration  of  a  four-year  term,  the  incumbent 
is  not  reappointed.  In  such  a  case  the  vacancy  is  under  pres- 
ent practice  filled  by  a  political  appointment  precisely  as  be- 
fore the  issuance  of  President  Wilson's  order.  The  data  re- 
garding the  appointment  of  postmasters  contained  in  the  annual 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  131 

report  of  the  Post  Office  Department  are  unfortunately  not 
sufficiently  full  to  disclose  the  relative  proportions  of  appoint- 
ments with  and  without  examinations,  and  of  reappointments 
and  original  appointments.  But  whatever  the  figures,  it  does 
not  seem  open  to  question  that  the  original  order  ought  to  be 
amended  so  as  to  apply  to  vacancies  arising  by  expiration  of 
the  four-year  term  where  the  incumbent  is  not  reappointed. 
Were  this  amendment  made,  the  pressure  upon  the  President 
to  replace  an  efficient  postmaster,  upon  the  expiration  of  his 
four-year  term,  by  a  political  appointee — a  pressure  the  force 
of  which  was  signally  illustrated  in  connection  with  the  New 
York  postmastership  but  a  few  months  before  President  Wil- 
son issued  his  order — would  completely  disappear.  Such  an 
order  in  efifect  would  completely  remove  the  postmasterships 
from  politics,  except  to  the  extent  that  pplitical  pressure  might 
be  brought  by  a  present  incumbent  to  secure  his  reappointment 
instead  of  the  throwing  open  of  the  post  to  open  competition. 
President  Wilson's  order  was  issued  on  March  31,  191 7, 
but  it  was  naturally  some  months  before  the  methods  to  be  fol- 
lowed by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  in  conducting  the  novel 
type  of  examination  involved  were  settled  upon  and  applied. 
Up  to  June  30,  19 1 9,  the  order,  therefore,  had  been  in  prac- 
tical operation  something  less  than  two  years.  The  situation 
with  respect  to  the  presidential  postmasters  is  thus  that  they 
have  been  removed  from  politics  in  large  measure.  However, 
not  only  are  a  great  proportion,  if  not  the  majority  of  them 
still  political  appointees,  but  there  is  nothing  in  the  system  thus 
far  set  up  which  insures  that  this  proportion  will  diminish,  or 
in  fact  will  not  increase;  for  those  who  have  been  appointed 
upon  examination,  solely  for  merit,  may  at  the  expiration  of 
their  four-year  terms  be  displaced  by  political  appointees.  The 
current  system  is  thus  at  best  an  unstable  and  precarious  one, 
and  needs  to  be  reen  forced  by  changes  in  the  executive  order 
now  in  force,  along  the  lines  above  suggested.  As  has  been 
pointed  out  with  respect  to  local  officers  generally,  a  perma- 
nently satisfactory  system,  of  course,  can  come  only  through 
legislation  definitely  abrogating  the  four-year  term,  and  plac- 


132  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

ing  postmasterships  scjiiarcly  in  the  competitive  class  under 
the  civil  service  law  and  rules. ^ 

Chief  National  Bank  Examiners. — A  group  of  local  chief 
officers  who,  though  not  presidential  appointees,  are  in  the  ex- 
cepted class,  are :  the  chief  national  bank  examiners,  of  whom 
there  are  12,  one  in  each  of  the  Federal  Reserve  cities;  the 
subordinate  bank  examiners,  of  whom  there  are  at  the  pres- 
ent time  129.  These  are  also  in  the  excepted  class,  and 
both  groups  may  conveniently  be  considered  together.  The 
practice  of  appointing  these  employees  without  examination  had 
prevailed  for  many  years  after  the  enactment  of  the  civil 
service  law  despite  the  absence  of  any  specific  exception  in  the 
rules,  and  by  order  of  February  3,  1909,  this  practice  was 
given  legal  status  following  an  opinion  rendered  by  the  Attor- 
ney General  holding  that  these  positions  must  be  filled  by  open 
competitive  examination  unless  specifically  excepted.  The  Ex- 
ecutive Order  making  the  exception,  dated  February  3,  1909, 
gives  as  the  sole  reason  that  "the  present  Comptroller  of  the 
Currency,  as  well  as  former  occupants  of  that  position,  was  of 
the  opinion  that  owing  to  their  confidential  character  it  was 
impracticable  to  fill  these  positions  as  a  result  of  open  competi- 
tive examination."  "     And  the  Commission,  in  its  report  for 

^  On  May  10,  1921,  while  the  present  work  was  in  press,  President 
Harding  issued  a  new  Executive  Order  regarding  the  appointment  of 
first,  second,  and  third  class  postmasters.  It  requires  that  examinations 
shall  be  held  "when  a  vacancy  exists  or  hereafter  occurs  ...  if  such  a 
vacancy  is  not  filled  by  nomination  of  some  person  within  the  competitive 
classified  civil  service  who  has  the  required  qualifications."  The  defect  in 
the  Executive  Order  of  March  31,  1917.  is  thus  cured.  The  new  order, 
however,  permits  the  Postmaster  General  to  submit  to  the  President  "the 
name  of  any  one  of  the  highest  three  qualified  eligibles  for  appointment 
unless  it  is  established  that  the  character  or  residence  of  any  such  appli- 
cant disqualify  him  for  appointment."  The  order  of  March  31,  1917, 
required  the  Postmaster  General  to  submit  to  the  President  the  name  of 
the  one  highest  qualified  eligible.  The  new  order  contains  a  proviso  that 
at  the  expiration  of  the  term  of  any  person  appointed  to  such  a  position 
through  examination  before  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  the  Postmaster 
General  may  in  his  discretion  submit  the  name  of  such  person  to  the 
President  for  renomination  without  further  examination.  It  does  not  re- 
quire the  retention  of  the  incumbent  provided  he  has  been  efficient.  The 
new  order,  with  its  provisions  for  the  selection  of  one  of  the  three  highest 
and  for  new  examinations  on  the  expiration  of  the  four-year  term,  still 
leaves  open  a  wide  possibility  for  political  preference. 

'Twenty-sixth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission, 
(1909),  p.  113- 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  133 

1910,  stated  that  "the  highly  confidential  character  of  their 
employment  and  the  degree  to  which  the  personal  element  en- 
ters in  determining  fitness  are  the  reasons  advanced  by  the 
Department  for  treating  these  employees  as  in  the  excepted 
class."  ^  It  is  difficult  to  understand  why  the  Commission 
should  have  recommended  this  exception  to  the  President.  In 
point  of  fact,  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  himself,  in  the 
following  year,  was  stated  to  be  considering  the  competitive 
classification  of  bank  examiners,  though  no  action  was  taken.- 
Field  Services:  Subordinate  Personnel. — The  subordinate 
personnel  of  the  local  offices  and  establishments  in  part  are  ap- 
pointed by  the  head  of  the  service  and  in  part  by  the  officer 
in  charge  of  the  local  office  or  establishment.  In  the  case 
of  the  large  industrial  establishments  of  the  Government,  ar- 
senals, the  navy  yards,  and  the  like,  the  methods  followed  in 
the  employment  of  the  forces  of  mechanical  employees  are 
similar  to  those  followed  in  all  large  industrial  establishments. 
The  subordinate  personnel  of  the  field  service  (other  than 
postmasters)  not  in  the  competitive  service  are  as  follows: 

Presidential  Positions 

Positions  specifically  exempted  by  statute: 

Deputy  collectors  of  internal  revenue 

Deputy  marshals 

Employees  of  the  Federal  Farm  Loan  Board 

Positions  excepted  by  Civil  Service  rules : 

The  numerous  positions  which  have  already  been  listed  in  detail 
in  the  preceding  chapter. 

Deputy  Collectors  of  Internal  Revenue  afid  Deputy  Mar- 
shals.— The  case  of  the  deputy  collectors  of  internal  revenue 
and    the    deputy    marshals    is    of    special    interest    as    rep- 

*  Idem,  p.  II. 

'  Report  of  the  Council  of  the  National  Civil  Service  Reform  League 
contained  in  the  Proceedings  of  the  League,  1910,  p.  61. 

The  report  further  states  that  "the  matter  has  been  further  taken  up 
with  the  Comptroller  of  the  Currency.  Bank  failures  which  disclosed 
inefficient  investigations  make  such  an  extension  seem  desirable,  and  the 
fact  that  bank  examiners  of  New  York  City,  under  the  competitive  system, 
have  done  most  efficient  work  with  the  utmost  despatch,  makes  it  seem 
desirable." 


134  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

resenting  the  only  recent  instance  in  which  a  large  class  of 
subordinate  employees  have  been  withdrawn  from  the  opera- 
tion of  the  civil  service  law  and  the  system  of  competitive  selec- 
tion. The  deputy  collectors  of  internal  revenue  number  some 
1,500/  the  bulk  of  them  being  paid  from  $1,000  to  $1,500, 
with  a  maximum  salary  of  $3,000.  The  deputy  marshals  are 
about  550  in  number,-  and  their  scale  of  salaries  is  slightly 
higher.  The  appointment  of  deputy  collectors  of  internal 
revenue  was  first  authorized  in  1864;  ^  that  of  deputy  marshals 
in  1 896."*  Appointment  is  made  by  the  collector  and  the  mar- 
shal respectively,  and  in  both  cases  the  principal  is  made  per- 
sonally responsible  for  the  acts  of  his  deputy.  Except  for  a 
brief  period,  from  1896  to  i899,'''  both  classes  of  positions,  be- 
cause of  the  personal  relation  thus  imported  by  the  statutes, 
had  been  exempt  from  competition ;  but  by  the  order  of  Novem- 
ber 7,  1906,  President  Roosevelt  placed  the  deputy  collectors 
in  the  competitive  class;  and  by  the  order  of  March  2,  1909, 
but  two  days  before  the  expiration  of  his  term,  he  took  similar 
action  with  respect  to  the  deputy  marshals.  By  these  orders 
the  incumbents  of  the  positions  were  "covered"  into  the  com- 
petitive class.  They,  however,  did  not  acquire  thereby  as 
secure  a  tenure  as  the  ordinary  competitive  employee,  for  the 
statutes  creating  their  positions  made  their  terms  dependent 
upon  that  of  their  several  principals.^    What  would  thus  seem 

^The  number  employed  during  the  fiscal  year  1918  was  1,283;  for  1920 
an  increase  to  1,837  was  estimated.    Book  of  Estimates,  1920,  p.  61. 

^868  in  IQ18,  Book  of  Estimates,  1920.  p.  829. 

^  Act  of  June  30,  1864,  Sec.  10 ;  13  Stat.,  225.  This  act  provided  that 
deputy  collectors  should  be  compensated  by  the  collector  personally.  By 
act  of  February  8,  1875,  as  amended  by  act  of  March  i,  1879  (20  Stat., 
329),  it  was  provided  that  their  compensation  should  thereafter  be  paid  by 
the  government. 

*Act  of  March  8,  1896  (Sec.  10),  29  Stat.  182. 

'^  The  general  revision  of  the  civil  service  rules,  promulgated  ATay  6, 
1896,  placed  in  the  competitive  class  many  positions  which  were  later 
withdrawn  from  competition  by  the  order  of  May  29,  1899. 

"  "A  newly  appointed  collector  of  internal  revenue  has\  a  legal  right, 
upon  taking  office,  to  drop  from  the  service  any  deputy  collector  in  com- 
mission and  to  appoint  deputies  of  his  own  selection  in  accordance  with 
the  rules  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission."  (Opinion  Atty.  Gen.,  Sept.  3, 
1907,  26  Op.  363.) 

A  ruling  similar  to  the  above  was  made  with  reference  to  United 
States  deputy  marshal  on  November  30,  1910,  by  the  Comptroller  of  the 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  135 

to  have  been  desired  in  the  premises  was  the  repeal  by  Congress 
of  the  special  provisions  responsible  for  this  peculiar  status  of 
these  officers.  Instead,  however,  Congress,  in  1913,  by  rider 
to  the  deficiency  appropriation  act,  enacted  "that  hereafter  any 
deputy  collector  of  internal  revenue  or  deputy  marshal  who  may 
be  required  ...  to  execute  a  bond  ...  to  secure  faithful 
performance  of  official  duty  may  be  appointed"  without  regard 
to  the  civil  service  law.^ 

It  is  difficult  to  see  wherein  the  duties  of  either  of  these 
classes  of  officers  in  any  degree  call  for  their  exemption  from 
the  civil  service  act.  The  fact  brought  out  in  the  act,  that 
these  officers  are  required  to  give  a  bond  to  their  immediate 
superiors,  far  from  furnishing  a  reason  for  their  exemption 
from  competitive  selection,  is  what  makes  such  selection  the 
more  practicable;  for  it  renders  of  less  importance  the  element 
of  personal  trust  which  is  theoretically  desirable  because  of  the 
personal  liability  of  the  collector  or  marshal  for  the  acts  of 
his  deputy. 

Indicative  of  the  almost  universal  acceptance  which  the 
merit  principle  has  achieved  is  the  fact  that,  upon  the  enact- 
ment of  the  legislation  under  discussion,  official  protestations 
were  issued,  on  behalf  of  the  administration,  that  no  de- 
parture from  the  principles  of  merit  was  contemplated.  The 
President  in  affixing  his  signature  to  the  bill,  issued  a  memor- 

Treasury,  who  held  that  the  term  of  a  deputy  marshal  expires  with  that  of 
the  marshal  who  appointed  him.  If  not  reappointed,  his  successor  must 
be  chosen  under  civil  service  rules.  (Decisions  of  the  Comptroller,  vol. 
17,  p.  362.) 

^  The  text  of  the  provision  is  as  follows : 

"That  hereafter  any  deputy  collector  of  internal  revenue  or  deputy 
marshal  who  may  be  required  by  law  or  by  authority  or  direction  of  the 
collector  of  internal  revenue  or  the  United  States  marshal  to  execute  a 
bond  to  the  collector  of  internal  revenue  or  United  States  marshal  to 
secure  faithful  performance  of  official  duty  may  be  appointed  by  the  said 
collector  or  marshal,  who  may  require  such  bond  without  regard  to  the 
provisions  of  an  act  of  Congress  entitled  'An  act  to  regulate  and  improve 
the  civil  service  of  the  United  States,'  approved  January  sixteenth,  eighteen 
hundred  and  eighty-three,  and  amendments  thereto,  or  any  rule  or  regula- 
tion made  in  pursuance  thereof,  and  the  officer  requiring  said  bond  shall 
have  power  to  revoke  the  appointment  of  any  subordinate  officer  or 
employee  and  appoint  his  successor  at  his  discretion  without  regard  to  the 
act,  amendments,  rules,  or  regulations  aforesaid."  (Act  of  October  22, 
1913;  38  Stat.,  208.) 


136  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

andimi  in  which,  after  resorting  to  the  unexpected  and  very 
doubtful  defense  that  "the  ofHces  of  deputy  collector  and  deputy 
marshal  were  never  intended  to  be  included  under  the  ordinary 
provisions  of  the  civil  service  law,"  he  pointed  out  that  "the 
control  of  the  whole  method  and  spirit  of  the  administration 
of  the  proviso  in  this  bill  which  concerns  the  appointment  of 
these  officers  is  no  less  entirely  in  my  hands  now  than  it  was 
before  the  bill  became  law"  ^  and  gave  assurance  that  there 
was  "no  danger  that  the  spoils  system  will  creep  in  with  my 
approval  or  connivance."  -  The  Commissioner  of  Internal 
Revenue  instructed  all  collectors  "that  the  object  of  this  pro- 
vision of  law  is  efficiency  and  only  efficiency,  and  that  any 
tendency  to  use  this  class  of  appointments  merely  for  personal 
reward,  or  for  anything  that  savors  of  the  spoils  system,  will 
be  regarded  as  a  very  serious  disregard  of  public  duty" ;  and 
he  ordered  that  changes  in  the  personnel  of  the  force  of  deputy 
collectors  could  be  made  only  with  his  approval.  Similar  in- 
structions were  issued  by  the  Attorney  General  with  respect  to 
deputy  marshals. 

The  number  of  removals  and  new  appointments  that  have 
been  made  under  the  authority  granted  by  this  proviso  has  not 
been  published,  nor  are  any  data  available  indicating  the  extent 
to  which  the  action  taken  has  been  "for  efficiency  and  only  effi- 
ciency." Whatever  the  facts  may  be,  however,  not  a  single 
valid  reason  has  been  advanced  why  these  two  classes  of  local 
employees  should  not  be  selected  through  public  competition.^ 

'  This  statement  is  correct  only  in  a  very  general  sense.  Before  the 
enactment  of  this  proviso,  the  appointment  of  deputy  collectors  and  deputy 
marshals  had  been  controlled  by  the  civil  service  laws  and  it  would  have 
required  express  action  of  the  President  to  remove  it  from  competitive 
examination  under  the  supervision  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission — 
action  which  had  never  been  taken.  Under  the  present  provision  it  would 
require  positive  action  by  the  President  to  establish  any  form  of  control 
or  even  direction  over  the  method  of  appointment.  No  such  action  has 
been  taken,  except  that  the  instructions  of  the  Commissioner  of  Internal 
Revenue  and  the  Attorney  General,  referred  to  below,  were  probably  issued 
at  the  direction  of  the  President. 

'Quoted  in  Thirty-first  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service 
Commission  (1914),  P-  138. 

'  An  excellent  discussion  of  this  matter  is  contamcd  m  the  letter  from 
the  Civil  Service  Commission  to  the  President  reproduced  in  the  Twenty- 
seventh  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission  (1910), 
p.  145- 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  137 

Field  Ejiipluyccs :  Federal  Farm  Loan  Board. — The  field 
employees  of  the  Federal  Farm  Loan  Board  are  excepted 
from  the  provisions  of  the  civil  service  act  by  the  law  creat- 
ing the  Board,  which  excepts  the  entire  personnel.  That  ex- 
ception has  already  been  characterized  as  indefensible,  and 
nothing  regarding  the  field  forces  offers  any  reason  for  modify- 
ing this  characterization.  Although  this  force,  like  the  force 
at  Washington,  has  been  selected  in  fact  with  a  due  regard 
for  merit,  its  exception  is  inconsistent  with  the  principle  of  the 
civil  service  law  and  is  particularly  undesirable.  Should  an 
appointment  to  such  positions  as  that  of  appraiser  l^e  made 
for  political  reasons,  the  appointee  would  be  peculiarly  subject 
to  improper  influence,  a  danger  particularly  to  be  guarded 
against  in  this  service.  The  same  is  applicable  to  such  of  the 
local  employees  of  the  Bureau  of  War  Risk  Insurance  as  are 
appointed  without  competition  under  the  special  statutory  ex- 
ception of  the  technical  employees  of  the  bureau. 

The  remaining  exceptions  to  the  competitive  principle  in 
the  classified  field  service  fall  chiefly  in  the  class  of  skilled 
labor  and  in  the  special  classes  in  which  the  service  recjuired  is 
temporary,  occasional,  or  of  a  part-time  character ;  or  in  which 
the  work  is  carried  on  in  such  unusual  locations  that  competi- 
tion would  be  impracticable  or  where  the  salary  offered  is  so 
low  that  no  competition  would  be  likely  to  be  secured. 

The  specific  exceptions  falling  under  this  head  have  been 
reviewed  already  in  the  preceding  chapter,  and  the  position 
there  taken,  that  these  exceptions  are  in  the  main  justifiable 
in  the  interests  of  good  administration,  though  in  a  measurable 
proportion  of  the  cases  no  inconvenience  to  the  service  would 
result,  and  the  principle  of  formal  selection  would  be  better 
observed,  were  a  system  of  provisional  appointment  subject  to 
non-competitive  examination  or  approval  by  the  Civil  Service 
Commission  substituted  for  the  unregulated  methods  of  selec- 
tion which  now  prevail.  • 

Postal  Employees:  Star  Routes  and  Third  and  Fourth 
Class  Post  Offices. — The  only  class  of  employees  to  which 
attention  may  here  be  called  is  that  of  postal  employees  on  the 


138  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

star  routes  or  in  third  or  l\)urth  class  post  offices.  This  class 
of  employees  includes  more  persons  than  any  other  group  in 
one  of  the  most  numerous  classes  of  federal  employees  to  be 
found  anywhere  in  the  service.  Strictly  speaking,  however, 
they  are  not  to  be  regarded  as  federal  employees,  since  their 
salaries  are  fixed  and  paid,  not  by  the  Government,  but  by  the 
postmasters  of  the  several  offices  in  which  they  are  employed. 
From  the  standpoint  of  the  federal  personnel  system  they  are 
oi  interest  only  to  the  extent  that  it  is  the  duty  and  interest  of 
the  Government  to  see  that  these  employees  are  provided  with 
proper  working  conditions  and  are  not  unduly  exploited  by  the 
postmasters  for  whom  they  work,  requirements  which  it  is  dif- 
ficult for  the  Government  to  meet.  They  are  also  of  interest 
in  view  of  the  civil  service  rule  which  provides  that  when  a 
post  office  is  advanced  to  the  second  class  the  employees  of 
that  office  acquire  the  status  of  competitive  postal  clerks,  pro- 
vided only  that  they  satisfy  the  Postmaster-General  of  their 
ability.^ 

Laborers. — The  appointment  of  laborers  in  the  local  offices 
and  establishments,  like  the  appointment  of  those  who  serve 
in  Washington,  has  been  made  a  subject  of  regulations  by 
the  President  pursuant  to  the  authority  conferred  upon  him  by 
the  act  of  1871.  These  regulations  -  do  not  apply  to  all  la- 
borers in  the  field  but  only  to  those  in  cities  or  to  branches  of 
the  service  designated  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission.     Up 

*  The  rule  provides  (Rule  II,  sec.  7)  that  on  the  date  of  the  effect  of 
such  order  (for  the  advancement  of  an  office  from  third  class  to  second 
class  or  for  the  consolidation  of  any  office  with  one  of  the  first  or  second 
classes)  these  rules  shall  apply  to  positions,  officers,  and  employees  of  the 
offices  affected  in  the  same  manner  as  they  apply  to  others  now  classified, 
and  all  appointments  after  an  eligible  register  has  been  estalilished  shall 
be  made  by  selection  from  the  register;  but  no  officer  or  employee  in  any 
post  office  shall  be  classified  under  the  terms  of  the  section  who  fails  to 
establish  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  Postmaster  General  his  capacity  for 
efficient  service  in  the  position  held ;  and  if  he  has  been  appointed  to  such 
office  within  less  than  60  days  prior  to  the  application  of  these  rules,  he 
shall  not  be  classified  without  the  express  consent  of  the  Commission." 
It  may  be  noted  that  in  this  rule  the  term  "classified"  is  used  in  llic  narrow 
and  incorrect  sense  of  "classified  competitive."  Incidentally,  tliis  incorrect 
use  of  the  term  occurs  in  the  very  rule  in  which  the  definition  of 
"classified"  is  laid  down. 

*  Promulgated  July  3,  1909,  and  amended.  They  are  to  be  found  in 
the  annual  report  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  139 

to  June  30,  191 5,  the  regulations  had  been  extended  by  the 
Civil  Service  Commission  to  some  forty  cities  and  to  all  un- 
skilled labor  positions  in  the  assistant  custodian  and  janitor 
service  under  the  Treasury  Department,  that  is  in  the  public 
buildings.  It  is  particularly  desirable  that  these  regulations 
should  be  put  into  force  over  the  remainder  of  the  field  service 
as  rapidly  as  possible.  Minor  as  are  the  positions  involved 
they  have  always  been  a  fruitful  field  for  the  spoilsman.  It 
must  be  admitted,  however,  that  owing  to  the  undesirable  char- 
acter and  very  low  remuneration  of  these  positions  in  the  fed- 
eral service  the  competition  for  them,  even  where  competitive 
methods  are  applied,  is  so  slight  as  to  have  virtually  no  effect. 
The  efifort  of  the  spoilsman  in  this  field  is  not  so  much  to  have 
a  particular  individual  appointed  as  it  is  to  have  a  position 
created  or  to  have  an  unnecessary  one  retained  so  that  the 
object  of  his  solicitude  may  be  taken  care  of.  This  sort  of 
political  influence  is  beyond  the  reach  of  personnel  methods.  It 
is  the  province  of  the  financial  and  not  of  the  personnel  ad- 
ministration to  prevent  the  creation  or  retention  of  unnecessary 
posts. 

Foreign  Service. — The  foreign  service  of  the  government 
falls  into  two  main  divisions,  the  diplomatic  and  the  consular. 
In  the  diplomatic  service,  the  "ambassadors  and  other  public 
ministers  (including  doubtless  commissioners,  charges  d'af- 
faires, and  agents),  are  required  by  the  Constitution  to  be 
appointed  by  the  President  by  and  with  the  advice  and  consent 
of  the  Senate.  The  statutes  also  require  that  appointments 
of  secretaries  of  embassy  and  legation,  and  of  secretaries,  be 
made  by  the  President  and  Senate;  ^  and,  as  already  stated,  a 
system  of  non-competitive  selection  has  been  set  up  for  these 
positions  by  executive  order.  Clerks,  interpreters,  and  stu- 
dent interpreters  at  the  embassies  and  legations  are  appointed 
by  the  Secretary  of  State.  These  employees  are,  therefore, 
within  the  scope  of  the  civil  service  law;  but  a  provision  of  the 
rules  covering  "any  person  employed  in  a  foreign  country  under 

*  Revised  Statutes,  Sec.  1684. 


I40  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

the  State  Department"  ^  excepts  them  from  regular  civil 
service  examination.  Except  in  so  far  as  a  non-competitive  ex- 
amination is  conducted  by  the  State  Department,  the  clerks  for 
foreign  service  are  selected  without  examination. 

In  the  consular  service,  a  similar  condition  obtains.  "Con- 
suls" (v^hich  term  includes  "consular  agents")  must  also  un- 
der the  Constitution  be  appointed  by  the  President  and  Senate ; 
while  the  clerical  employees  of  the  several  consulates  are  ex- 
cepted from  examination  under  the  provision  of  the  civil 
service  rules  just  quoted.  The  non-competitive  examination 
system  of  the  State  Department,  however,  is  applied  to  both. 
In  the  whole  field  of  the  foreign  service,  therefore,  it  is  virtually 
only  the  highest  positions,  that  of  ambassador  or  minister — 
or,  as  it  is  sometimes  called,  chief  of  mission — that  is  not  em- 
braced in  the  system  of  formal  non-competitive  selection  ad- 
ministered by  the  Department  of  State. 

All  the  posts  of  ambassadors  and  ministers — are,  as  is  well 
known,  political.  The  executive  order  of  1909,  setting  up  a 
formal  system  of  selection  for  diplomatic  secretaries,  provides 
that  the  Secretary  of  State  shall  recommend  to  the  President 
secretaries  of  embassy  or  of  legation  who  are  capable  of  be- 
ing promoted  to  the  post  of  chief  of  mission.  If  such  recom- 
mendations have  been  made  on  the  occurrence  of  vacancies  in 
posts  of  chief  of  mission,  they  have  been  disregarded  by  the 
President  in  virtually  all  cases ;  for  the  order  has  had  little  or 
no  effect  whatever  in  ameliorating  the  purely  political  selec- 
tion for  those  posts  except  possibly  some  of  the  minor  ones. 

That  the  entrance  of  political  considerations  in  the  selection 
for  these  posts  is  improper,  that  it  results  in  an  inferior  type 
of  diplomatic  service,  and  that  in  no  other  great  nation  is  the 
principle  of  purely  political  appointment  to  posts  of  this  char- 
acter in  force  are  all  well  worn  truisms  which  have  been  put 
before  the  public  repeatedly  in  recent  years.  It  is  difficult 
to  find  a  specific  remedy  for  this  situation  owing  to  the  diffi- 
culty of  devising  any  formal  or  rigid  system  of  selection.     A 

•  Schedule  A,  I,  7. 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  141 

committee  of  the  National  Civil  Service  Reform  League, 
which  recently  made  a  study  of  this  entire  subject,  came  to 
the  conclusion  that  the  next  step  should  be  merely  "that  the 
President  be  urged  to  fill  the  post  of  minister  by  the  promo- 
tion of  capable  officers  in  the  foreign  service  and  that  when  a 
vacancy  occurs  the  Secretary  of  State  he  required  to  submit 
to  the  President  for  his  consideration  the  names  of  secretaries 
and  consuls  who  merit  promotion,"  and  "that  the  President 
be  urged  in  as  far  as  practicable  to  promote  ministers  to 
embassies  when  vacant."  ^  It  must  be  admitted  that  while 
this  recommendation  is  doubtless  all  that  is  practicable  under 
the  circumstances  (for  any  legislation  looking  to  the  taking 
of  these  officers  out  of  the  presidential  class  or  limiting  the 
presidential  power  of  removal  is  clearly  barred  by  the  Con- 
stitution) it  furnishes  no  very  concrete  material  on  which  to 
work.- 

It  may  be  questioned  whether  there  is  not  a  tendency  on 
the  part  of  some  of  the  advocates  of  the  merit  principle  to 
over-emphasize  the  value  as  applied  to  the  diplomatic  service  of 
that  principle  of  selection  from  within  the  service  which  is  ad- 
mittedly and  perhaps  unquestionably  sound  as  applied  to  most 
branches  of  the  federal  service.  While  every  chief  of  mission, 
of  course,  should  be  possessed  of  a  generous  intellectual  equip- 
ment in  the  field  of  history  and  politics  and  international  af- 
fairs, and  while  a  knowledge  of  the  more  technical  aspects 
of  international  law  and  etiquette  are  obviously  an  asset  of 
the  highest  value  for  the  purpose,  it  by  no  means  follows  that 
the  best  diplomatic  representative  can  always  be  found  in 
the  ranks  of  the  permanent  diplomatic  service.  Diplomacy  in 
its  more  difficult  and  important  aspects  is,  after  all,  a  political 
rather  than  a  technical  matter,  and  it  may  well  be  that  on  occa- 
sions the  country's  interests  would  be  poorly  served  were  the 

'  Report  on  the  Foreign  Service,  p.  ig. 

'  It  is  significant  that  an  earh'er  declaration  of  the  National  Civil 
Service  Reform  League  advocated  the  invariable  selection  of  ambassadors 
and  ministers  from  the  permanent  personnel  of  the  lower  ranks.  See 
Good  Government,  1918,  p.  irg;  apparently  the  committee  on  the  foreign 
service  regarded  this  recommendation  as  impracticable. 


142  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

President  to  restrict  his  choice  too  rigorously  to  the  member- 
ship of  the  permanent  diplomatic  corps.  It  is  notable  that 
some  of  the  foreign  nations  in  which  the  tradition  of  a  perma- 
nent diplomatic  personnel  has  long  been  well  established  have 
broken  away  from  the  tradition  from  time  to  time,  and  es- 
pecially in  recent  years,  and  appointed  to  their  most  important 
missions  men  without  previous  diplomatic  experience,  but  of 
tested  political  wisdom.  Moreover,  the  long  life  of  the  tradi- 
tion of  a  permanent  diplomatic  corps  in  those  countries  has 
had  the  effect  of  bringing  into  the  service  at  an  early  age 
men  of  a  type  who  are  not  likely  to  be  attracted  into  our  diplo- 
matic service  until  the  tradition  of  selection  of  these  men  on  a 
merit  basis  from  within  the  service  has  long  been  well  estab- 
lished. So  for  many  years  to  come  it  is  probable  that  less 
promising  material,  on  the  average,  will  be  available  for  promo- 
tion to  the  highest  missions  in  our  service,  than  in  the  French 
or  British,  for  example.  All  this  is  not  to  say,  of  course,  that 
it  is  proper  under  any  circumstances  that  diplomatic  missions 
should  be  awarded  to  "deserving  Democrats"  or  for  the  pur- 
pose of  enabling  politicians  with  social  aspirations  to  bask  in 
the  atmosphere  of  foreign  courts;  it  is  intended  merely  to 
emphasize  that  the  extreme  application  of  the  principle  of  selec- 
tion from  within  the  service,  so  frequently  urged  by  civil  service 
reformers,  here  needs  to  be  accepted  with  great  caution. 
Conclusion. — If  all  administrative  officers  and  all  subordi- 
nate personnel  originally  were  selected  on  a  wholly  non- 
political  merit  basis,  by  means  of  formalized  methods,  and 
were  an  effective  prohibition  placed  on  the  intervention 
of  politicians  outside  the  service  in  any  manner  whatso- 
ever in  personnel  matters,  it  is  altogether  likely  that  no  fur- 
ther measures  would  need  to  be  taken  to  exclude  politics 
from  the  administration  of  the  federal  ])ersonnel  system. 
The  administrator,  himself  wholly  non-polilical  and  subject 
to  no  outside  influence,  might  safely  be  entrusted  with 
as  full  a  measure  of  discretion  in  personnel  matters  as  is  ac- 
corded the  manager  in  private  enterprises.  This  does  not  mean 
that  discretion  would  be  absolute.     Even   in  private  enter- 


FORMAL  SYSTEMS  OF  SELECTION  143 

prises  of  the  larger  kind  it  is  found  necessary  to  estalDlish  rules 
and  procedures  to  insure  that  not  merely  in  general  but  in  every 
individual  case  the  employee  shall  receive  the  full  measure  of 
justice  and  consideration,  and  that  all  shall  be  treated  alike; 
and,  obviously,  restrictions  of  this  kind  will  always  be  equally 
necessary  in  public  personnel  systems.  But  further  restriction, 
aimed  specifically  at  the  abuse  of  discretion  for  political  pur- 
poses, will  be  unnecessary. 

In  the  present  situation,  however,  with  the  majority  of 
chief  officers  still  selected  and  removed  on  political  grounds, 
with  political  appointment  and  removal  still  obtaining  over  a 
not  inconsiderable  area  of  the  subordinate  personnel,  and  with 
virtually  no  progress  made  in  prohibiting  the  interference  of 
politicians  outside  the  service  with  the  action  of  the  adminis- 
trator in  personnel  matters,  the  need  for  additional  protection 
against  political  influence  is  felt  at  a  number  of  points.  The 
precise  nature  and  extent  of  the  restrictions  and  procedures 
designed  to  afford  such  protection,  however,  may  be  consid- 
ered profitably  only  in  conjunction  with  the  detailed  consid- 
eration of  the  several  phases  of  personnel  administration  in 
the  second  part  of  this  volume.  The  personnel  practices  of 
the  government  are,  and  under  existing  conditions  should  be, 
a  compound  of,  and  not  infrequently  a  compromise  between, 
the  dictates  of  personnel  administration  proper,  and  of  the 
need  for  protection  against  political  interference.  Hence,  as 
applied  to  specific  procedures  and  regulations,  the  latter  can 
be  usefully  described  only  in  conjunction  with  the  former. 
In  the  second  part  of  this  volume,  devoted  though  it  is  to  per- 
sonnel administration  proper,  it  will  be  necessary  frequently 
to  consider  what  procedures  or  regulations  should  be  adopted 
under  the  basic  relations  between  the  federal  personnel  system 
and  the  political  world  now  prevailing,  to  prevent  the  intrusion 
of  political  influence  at  this  point  and  that. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE   ELIMINATION   OF   POLITICAL   INTERFERENCE  INSIDE 

THE  SERVICE 

In  the  foregoing  chapter  the  complete  elimination  of  poli- 
tics in  selection,  and  particularly  in  the  selection  of  the  direct- 
ing personnel,  with  the  exception  of  the  heads  of  executive 
departments,  was  declared  to  be  the  sine  qua  non  of  the  es- 
tablishment of  a  proper  personnel  system.  But  even  were  the 
entire  personnel  selected  solely  on  a  basis  of  merit,  or  at  least 
through  the  application  of  formal  systems  of  recruitment, 
guard  would  still  have  to  be  kept  against  the  intrusion  of  po- 
litical influence  at  various  points  in  the  personnel  system.  To 
devise  a  formal  system  of  recruitment  which  will  absolutely 
exclude  the  need  for  the  exercise  of  any  discretion  whatever 
by  the  administrative  officer  is  difficult,  and  with  respect  to 
some  classes  of  positions  virtually  impossible.  In  matters  af- 
fecting the  employee  after  selection,  such  as  assignmefit,  pro- 
motion, demotion,  increase  or  reduction  of  salary,  removal, 
and  retirement,  it  is,  from  the  standpoint  of  sound  adminis- 
tration, still  more  difficult  and,  in  addition,  very  unwise  to 
attempt  to  limit  severely  the  discretion  of  the  administrative 
officer.  At  all  these  points  he  must  be  allowed  some  discre- 
tion; and  at  all  these  points  there  is  danger,  even  though  the 
administrative  officer  be  a  non-political,  permanent  officer  and 
the  employee  himself  appointed  wholly  without  political  in- 
fluence, that  the  employee  affected  may  seek  to  enlist  political 
influence  on  his  behalf. 

Since  this  would  be  true,  even  if  all  of  personnel,  from 
lowest  to  highest,  were  chosen  by  formal  methods  of  a  more 
or  less  competitive  character,  it  need  not  be  said  that  in  the 
federal  service,  where,  as  just  seen,  the  greater  part  of  the 
directing  personnel  and  no  small  part  of  the  subordinate  per- 

144 


ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICAL  INTERFERENCE    145 

sonnel  is  still  selected  wholly  without  formal  methoils  or  com- 
petition and  chiefly  on  political  grounds,  the  need  for  rigidly 
excluding  politicians  outside  the  service  from  influencing  ad- 
ministrative action  in  personnel  matters  is  a  most  vital  one. 
The  Congressman  and  Political  Interference. — Political 
influence  in  respect  to  personnel  matters  is  usually  brought 
to  bear  on  federal  administrative  officers  in  behalf  of  an  em- 
ployee or  prospective  employee  through  "his"  Representative, 
but  sometimes  through  "his"  Senator.  In  the  case  of  local 
offices  an  unofficial  politician  may  be  the  medium,  but  even 
here  the  Representative  or  Senator  is  usually  brought  into 
action.  In  some  cases  the  person  thus  invoking  the  good 
offices  of  his  representative  is  an  active  political  worker,  but 
the  rigor  and  the  increasingly  effective  enforcement  of  the 
civil  service  rules  prohibiting  undue  political  activity  by  classi- 
fied employees  ^  make  it  improbable  that  one  who  is  already 
an  employee  is  anything  more  than  a  friend  or  relative  of  an 
active  political  worker.  In  perhaps  as  many  cases  as  not, 
moreover,  the  person  seeking  congressional  intervention  is 
merely  a  constituent  of  the  Congressman  with  no  special  claim 
to  consideration  whatever.  It  is  one  of  the  peculiarities  of  the 
congressional  temperament  to  be  unable  to  refuse  a  request 
for  intervention  on  behalf  of  a  constituent  -  even  though  the 

^  These  rules  are  discussed  in  the  following  chapter. 

'  While  referring  primarily  to  a  matter  of  economy  rather  than  of 
personnel  administration  proper,  the  following  colloquy  in  the  Senate  on 
December  4,  1919,  is  ilkistrative  of  the  readiness  with  which  members  of 
Congress  lend  themselves  to  intervention  in  personnel  matters : 

Mr.  Thomas.  "I  think  there  is  another  reason  which  prevents  the 
reduction  of  the  civil  service  force,  and  that  is  Congress,  or,  rather,  the 
individual  Members  of  the  two  Houses.  The  Senator  will  correct  me  if 
I  am  wrong,  because  he  knows,  but  I  was  informed  that  a  reduction  was 
made,  or  proposed  to  be  made,  in  one  of  the  departments  some  time  ago." 

Mr.  Smoot.     "In  the  War  Department." 

Mr.  Thomas.  "A  reduction  of  500  employees,  and  within  24  hours 
i6g  protests  personal  and  by  letter,  were  lodged  by  Members  of  both 
Houses  of  Congress  against  the  reduction,  as  affecting  certain  of  their 
constituents,  with  the  result  that  the  movement  was  aborted  and  paralyzed, 
and  then  abandoned.     Is  that  correct?" 

Mr.  Smoot.  "The  Senator  is  correct.  There  were  169  protests  within 
24  hours." 

Mr.  Thomas.  "One  can  imagine  the  number  of  protests  that  would 
have  been  made  if  the  reduction  had  been  5,000  instead  of  500."  (Con- 
gressional Record,  December  4,  1919,  p.  114.) 


146  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Representative  may  be  morallv  certain  in  advance  that  such 
intervention  will  avail  his  constituent  nothing,  as  is  indeed 
often  the  case.  Hence  admdnistrative  officers  are  continually 
pestered  with  merely  perfunctory  recommendations  and  re- 
quests from  Congressmen  with  reference  to  proposed  appoint- 
ments, assignments,  promotions,  salary  increases  and  reduc- 
tions, removals,  and  indeed  all  other  matters  of  personnel 
affecting  the  fortunes  of  indixiduals.  A  courteous  acknowl- 
edgment or  promise  of  consideration  by  the  administrative 
officer  usually  satisfies  the  etiquette  of  the  case.  To  this 
extent,  congressional  intervention  is  more  serious  as  an  annoy- 
ance than  as  a  factor  in  actually  influencing  personnel 
administration. 

Where,  however,  a  Representative  or  Senator  chooses  for 
whatever  reason  to  take  a  real  interest  in  the  fortunes  of  a 
particular  employee,  and  to  make  real  exertions  on  his  behalf, 
he  is  generally  able  to  bring  influences  to  bear  which  only  a 
very  courageous  and  very  well  intrenched  administrative  of- 
ficer can  resist.  Particularly  is  this  so  if  the  Representative  or 
Senator  in  cpiestion  is  a  member  of  the  appropriations  com- 
mittee which  passes  on  any  part  of  the  appropriations  for  the 
service  with  which  that  officer  is  connected,  or  indeed  for  any 
branch  of  the  executive  department  in  which  that  service  falls; 
or  if,  though  not  himself  a  member  of  the  committee,  the  Rep- 
resentative or  Senator  possesses,  through  political  or  log-roll- 
ing connections,  a  measure  of  influence  with  that  committee. 
Every  head  of  a  service,  or  of  any  distinct  branch  of  a  service 
for  which  Congress  appropriates  separately,  lives  ever  in  the 
fear  of  the  pruning  knife,  or  even  the  ax,  of  the  appropria- 
tions committees.  Those  liranches  of  the  service  whose  func- 
tions are  well  established  by  tradition,  or  whose  continuous  op- 
eration on  an  adequate  scale  is  indispensable,  of  course,  stand 
in  less  'danger  of  drastic  reductions  in  appropriation  than  do 

A  former  important  officer  at  Washington  has  toUl  the  writer  of  an 
instance  in  which  tlie  entire  congressional  delegation  from  a  certain  state, 
two  Senators  and  three  Confrrcssmen.  had  visited  his  office  in  a  hody  to 
intercede  on  behalf  of  a  native  son  who  had  been  dismissed  for  habitual 
drunkenness  and  neglect  of  duty. 


ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICAL  INTERFERENCE    147 

those  whose  functions  are  novel  or  of  more  doubtful  necessity. 
But  even  where  no  reduction  in  appropriations  is  to  be  feared, 
the  head  of  a  department  is  ever  seeking  their  enlargement 
and  must  think  long  before  denying  the  request  of  a  Repre- 
sentative or  Senator  on  whose  vote  in  committee,  or  on  whose 
intervention  with  the  committee,  may  some  day  depend  the 
fate  of  an  important  requested  increase  in  appropriation. 
There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  effective  interference  of  the 
individual  Representative  or  Senator  in  personnel  matters 
derives  largely  from  the  detailed  control  of  Congress  over 
appropriations,  as  exercised  by  its  several  committees. 

A  measure  of  relief  from  this  condition  is  likely  to  be  found 
from  the  development  toward  a  more  ordered  procedure  and 
a  more  concentrated  authority  for  the  formulation  and  adop- 
tion of  the  federal  appropriation  measures.  This  will  almost 
inevitably  reduce  the  possibility  of  the  use  of  the  appropriat- 
ing power  to  strike  at  an  administrative  officer  who  has 
incurred  congressional  displeasure. 

Another  factor  which  has  been  of  much  importance  in 
perpetuating  the  tradition  of  interference  by  politicians,  and 
more  especially  by  members  of  Congress,  in  personnel  mat- 
ters, has  been  the  failure  of  Congress,  and  perhaps  even  more 
specifically  of  the  President  and  the  Civil  Service  Commission, 
to  develop  the  necessary  machinery  for  the  routine  perform- 
ance of  some  of  the  elementary  processes  of  personnel  admin- 
istration. In  a  subsequent  chapter,  attention  will  be  called  to 
the  complete  failure  to  develop;  for  example,  any  machinery 
for  facilitating  the  transfer  of  employees  between  the  depart- 
ments, even  when  such  transfers  are  obviously  demanded  by 
the  needs  of  the  service,  and  indeed  the  failure  of  the  depart- 
ments themselves  to  develop  similar  machinery  with  respect 
to  transfer  among  the  several  services  of  the  same  department. 
The  natural  result  of  this  failure  has  been  that  the  employee 
seeking  a  transfer  and  having  open  to  him  no  regular  and 
formal  method  of  obtaining  it,  often  resorts  to  his  Representa- 
tive or  Senator  for  assistance.  In  fact,  if  a  newer  employee 
in  Washington  seeking  information  should  ask  an  older  one 


148  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

how  transfers  were  effected,  he  would  probably  be  told  that 
ordinarily  the  Representative  or  Senator  helps  the  employee  in 
bringing  himself  to  the  attention  of  the  office  to  which  he 
wishes  to  be  transferred.  Similar  instances  could  be  cited  at 
other  points  in  the  system.  The  establishment  of  adequate 
methods  and  machinery  under  all  these  heads  would  do  much 
to  weaken  the  tradition  of  political  intervention. 
Direct  Prohibition  of  Outside  Intervention  in  Personnel 
Matters. — There  is,  however,  a  more  direct  way  of  attack- 
ing the  evil,  not  only  as  respects  Congressmen  but  any  other 
individual  outside  the  service,  namely,  the  method  of  directly 
prohibiting  any  person  from  interceding  with  administrative 
officers  in  any  personnel  matter  whatsoever. 

So  obvious  is  the  need  for  a  direct  prohibition  of  this 
sort  that  an  attempt  to  secure  it  would  seem  to  be  one  of  the 
elementary  planks  in  any  program  of  civil  service  reform.  Yet 
in  virtually  none  of  the  laws  which  have  been  enacted  in  the 
various  jurisdictions  is  any  such  attempt  made.  In  the  fed- 
eral service  the  only  provision  of  law  under  this  head  is  that 
found  in  the  civil  service  act  (Section  lo)  which  prohibits  any 
person  concerned  in  giving  any  examination  or  making  ap- 
pointment under  the  act  from  "receiving  or  considering"  any 
recommendation  of  any  person  which  may  be  given  by  any 
Senator  or  any  member  of  the  House  "except  as  to  character 
or  residence  of  the  applicant." 

Aside  from  this  obviously  unenforceable  provision  no  leg- 
islation looking  to  a  prohibition  of  political  interference  with 
the  administration  of  personnel  matters  has  been  enacted,  or, 
so  far  as  known,  ever  been  introduced  in  Congress,  and  the 
civil  service  rules  contain  only  one  provision  aimed  in  this 
direction.^     This  is  the  provision  occurring  in  the  rule  bear- 

'  Durinp  the  period  1902-1912  there  were  in  effect  various  Executive 
Orders  proliibitin^  employees  from  soliciting  the  aid  of  Congressmen  (or 
Congressional  committees  of  Congress)  on  their  behalf.  While  they 
applied  in  terms  to  the  attempt  of  an  individual  emproyec  to  solicit  inter- 
vention on  his  personal  behalf,  they  were  essentially  directed  against 
attempts  of  groui)s  of  organizations  of  employees  to  influence  legislation; 
and  their  effect  as  rcs])ccts  traffic  between  individual  employees  and  Con- 
gressmen, while  substantial,  was  not  of  major  importance. 


ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICAL  INTERFERENCE    149 

ing  on  promotion,  which  prohibits  any  officer  concerned  in 
making  promotions  from  considering  any  recommendation  for 
the  promotion  of  a  classified  employee  unless  it  be  made  by 
the  person  under  whose  supervision  the  employee  has  served 
(Rule  II,  Paragraph  3),  This  regulation,  it  will  be  noted, 
does  not  prohibit  the  making  of  such  a  recommendation  ex- 
cept to  the  extent  that  it  provides  that  such  recommendation 
is  made  "with  the  knowledge  and  consent  of  the  employee" 
which  "shall  be  sufficient  cause  for  removing  him  from  the 
service." 

The  futile  character  of  the  existing  law  and  regulations, 
which  in  no  wise  penalize  the  person  making  the  recommenda- 
tions, which  authorize  no  penalty  upon  the  employee  (unless, 
in  the  case  of  the  regulation,  the  recommendation  is  made 
with  his  "knowledge  and  consent,"  an  element  which  could 
well  be  assumed  in  every  case  and  which  even  then  does  not 
require  the  penalizing  of  the  employee,  but  merely  authorizes 
such  penalty)  need  not  be  enlarged  upon.  It  is  hardly  neces- 
sary to  add  that  these  provisions  are  wholly  without  effect 
upon  the  current  situation. 

What  is  needed  is  an  express  prohibition  aimed  not  merely 
at  the  employee  but  at  the  person  making  the  recommendation 
or  interceding  in  any  way  for  an  employee.  The  situation 
calls  for  a  thoroughgoing  measure.  Legislation  making  it  a 
penal  ofifense  for  any  one  ^  to  make  any  recommendation  to 
an  administrative  officer  in  behalf  of  any  individual  employee 
would  largely  go  beyond  the  needs  of  the  case. 

It  will  be  argued,  of  course,  that  it  would  be  improper  to 
prohibit  a  Congressman  from  giving  his  opinion  to  an  admin- 
istrative officer  as  a  private  citizen ;  and  indeed  the  Postmaster 
General  in  recent  years  stated  that  in  submitting  to  the  Repre- 
sentative of  the  district  the  names  of  the  three  highest  eligibles 
for  fourth  class  postmaster  and  for  rural  carrier,  he  called 
upon  the  member  "not  in  his  capacity  as  a  member  of  any 

^  Exception  should  be  made,  of  course,  of  former  employers  or  teach- 
ers of  applicants  for  appointment,  when  recommendation  is  requested  by 
the  administration  officer. 


I50  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

political  party  but  solely  as  the  representative  of  the  com- 
munity regardless  of  political  affiliations."  ^  Aside  from  the 
question  whether  it  is  morally  or  intellectually  possible  for  the 
average  member  of  Congress  to  act  wholly  as  a  private  citizen, 
"regardless  of  political  affiliations,"  nothing  is  clearer  than 
that  in  the  overwhelming  majority  of  cases  Congressmen,  if 
they  act  at  all,  act,  and  must  continue  to  act  in  these  matters, 
as  politicians;  that  is  to  say,  in  the  ordinary  case  they  must 
put  the  wishes  of  the  constituent  above  the  interest  of  the 
service.  It  has  been  thought  perfectly  proper  for  the  Presi- 
dent to  promulgate  rules  prohibiting  the  active  participation  of 
classified  civil  service  employees  in  politics,  even  though  such 
activity  might  be  carried  on  wholly  in  the  character  of  a  pri- 
vate citizen  and  might  have  no  relation  whatever  to  the  duties 
of  the  employee.  In  precisely  the  same  way,  there  should  be 
no  objection  to  prohibiting  the  political  officers  of  the  gov- 
ernment from  participating  in  any  way  whatsoever  in  admin- 
istrative afTairs. 

Although  the  precise  method  here  proposed  may  be  some- 
what more  radical  than  would  be  generally  favored,  most 
Congressmen,  undoubtedly  most  of  the  better  sort,  would  them- 
selves strongly  favor  some  measure  of  relief  from  the  weari- 
some and  time-consuming  pressure  of  constituents  in  per- 
sonnel matters — something  which  would  enable  them  to  es- 
cape the  importunities  of  the  constituents  by  pleading  some 
statutory  or  other  overpowering  disability. 

Complementary  to  such  a  statutory  provision  there  should 
be  one  penalizing  the  individual,  whether  an  employee  or  merely 
an  applicant,  who  solicits  such  intervention  in  his  behalf. 
Whether  or  not  such  a  statute  be  enacted,  the  civil  service  rules 
themselves  ought  to  be  amended  immediately  so  as  to  direct 
summary  removal  of  any  employee,  and  the  debarment  from 
appointment  of  any  applicant,  on  whose  behalf  intervention  is 
made  unless  the  employee  can  show  positively  that  the  inter- 
vention was  unsought,  and  to  require  administrative  officers 

^  Statement  of  Postmaster  General,  November  17,  1917,  quoted  in  the 
Thirty-third  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission  (1916), 
p.  xvi. 


ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICAL  INTERFERENCE    151 

to  report  all  cases  of  intervention  directly  to  the  Civil  Serv- 
ice Commission. 

Location  of  Legal  Power  in  Personnel  Matters. — A  factor 
of  no  small  importance  in  determining  the  extent  of  political 
influence  in  personnel  matters  is  found  in  the  legal  provisions 
governing  the  location  of  the  power  of  appointment  and,  in- 
ferentially,  of  the  powers  of  promotion,  demotion,  salary  in- 
crease, and  assignment  and  removal.  As  already  seen,  the 
Constitution  itself  requires  that  "officers"  may  be  appointed 
only  by  the  President  (with  or  without  the  consent  of  the 
Senate),  by  the  courts  of  law  (which  may  be  neglected  for 
practical  purposes)  and  by  the  heads  of  departments.  As 
to  "employees  and  agents,"  it  is  the  general  rule  that  such 
persons,  unless  the  statute  providing  for  their  employment 
otherwise  directs,  shall  be  appointed  by  the  heads  of  depart- 
ments.^ With  respect  to  some  of  the  field  employees,  includ- 
ing even  some  who  might  be  regarded  as  "officers"  (for  exam- 
ple, deputy  marshals,  deputy  collectors  of  internal  revenue, 
etc.),  the  statute  has  provided  that  appointment  shall  be  by 
the  local  chief  officer,  but  again  certain  field  employees  are  by 
law  to  be  appointed  by  the  head  of  the  bureau  in  Washing- 
ton. 

The  net  effect  of  the  scheme  of  distribution  of  the  appoint- 
ing power  just  outlined  may  be  illustrated  by  applying  it  to 
a  single  typical  service  as,  for  example,  the  Internal  Revenue 
Service,  which  is  a  bureau  of  the  Treasury.  The  Commis- 
sioner of  Internal  Revenue  is  appointed  by  the  President  with 
the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate.  His  subordinates  at 
Washington  from  highest  to  lowest  are  appointed  by  the  Sec- 
retary of  the  Treasury.  Passing  to  the  field  establishments  of 
the  service,  the  collector  in  charge  of  each  collection  district 
is  appointed  by  the  President  with  the  consent  of  the  Sen- 
ate; while  the  subordinate  personnel,  the  deputy  collectors, 

*  "Each  head  of  department  is  authorized  to  employ  in  his  department 
such  number  of  clerks  of  the  several  classes  recognized  by  law  and  such 
messengers,  assistant  messengers,  copyists,  watchmen,  laborers,  and  other 
employees  ...  as  may  be  appropriated  for  by  Congress  from  year  to 
year."  (Act  of  April  22,  1854,  incorporated  in  Revised  Statutes,  Section 
169.) 


152  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

clerks,   etc.,   are  appointed   in  part   by   the   commissioner   at 
Washington,  and  in  part  by  the  collector. 

With  respect  to  the  great  mass  of  the  subordinate  per- 
sonnel, the  appointing  power  of  the  head  of  the  department 
is,  of  course,  a  pure  formality,  exercised  almost  invariably  per- 
functorily upon  the  recommendation  of  the  head  of  the  bu- 
reau, yet  the  legal  requirement  of  this  formality  has  the  result 
of  vesting  in  the  departmental  offices  a  control  over  personnel 
matters  which  not  infrequently  falls  in  large  measure  into  the 
hands  of  one  of  the  political  subordinates  who  stands  close 
to  the  Secretary.^  'A  door  is  thus  left  open  for  the  entrance 
of  political  pressure  in  a  quarter  which  is  more  susceptible  to 
political  pressure  than  is  the  non-political  head  of  a  bureau, 
and  which  at  least  is  as  likely  to  encourage  as  to  discourage 
any  tendency  on  the  part  of  a  political  bureau  head  to  yield 
to  such  pressure.  That  this  result  ensues,  not  merely  with 
respect  to  appointment  but  perhaps  still  more  with  respect  to 
promotions,  salary  increases,  reductions,  and  removals,  all  of 
which  must,  by  analogy,  receive  the  approval  of  the  Secretary, 
is  hardly  open  to  doubt.  In  the  interests  not  merely  of  ad- 
ministrative simplicity  and  decentralization,  but  of  reenforc- 
ing  the  merit  principle,  it  is  desirable  that,  in  every  case  in 
which  appointment  by  the  head  of  the  department  (and  the 
power  over  other  personnel  matters  which  usually  go  with  ap- 
pointment) is  not  required  by  the  Constitution,  it  should  be 
vested  in  the  bureau  chief. 

^Consistency  would  seem  to  demand  that  the  appointment 
of  all  subordinate  personnel  in  the  local  offices  should  be  vested 
in  the  hands  of  the  chief  of  those  local  offices.  Two  consid- 
erations, however,  must  be  kept  in  mind  in  this  connection. 

*Evcn  when  personnel  matters  of  the  department  arc  handled  on 
behalf  of  the  Secretary  by  a  non-political  officer,  the  system  favors  the 
entrance  of  political  considerations  in  so  far  as  that  officer  is  further  re- 
moved from  responsiliility  for  the  efficiency  of  the  several  services  than 
are  the  heads  of  those  services.  While  there  may  be  advantages,  from 
the  standpoint  of  record  systems,  of  concentrating  all  personnel  records 
in  a  single  office  in  each  department  (a  point  which  will  subsequently 
receive  attention)  it  by  no  means  follows  that  any  portion  of  the  actual 
power  should  be  vested  in  any  hands  other  than  those  of  the  head  of  the 
service. 


ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICAL  INTERFERENCE    153 

In  the  first  place,  almost  all  the  chiefs  of  local  offices  are  at 
the  present  time  purely  political  appointees  of  a  type  peculiarly 
subject  to  improper  partizan  and  personal  influences.  For 
this  reason  it  may  be  best  at  present  not  to  allow  them  to  ex- 
ercise, uncontrolled  by  Washington,  the  power  of  appoint- 
ment of  their  local  subordinates.  Another  factor  is  that  in 
not  a  few  of  the  services  the  local  personnel  is  regarded  as 
eligible  for  transfer  from  one  locality  to  another  and  this  is 
a  practice  which  on  all  accounts  should  be  encouraged  and 
strengthened.  Where  this  is  the  case  the  local  personnel  is  to 
that  extent  not  merely  local  but  a  part  of  the  personnel  of  the 
entire  service  and  the  discretion  of  the  local  officer  in  the 
control  of  this  personnel,  therefore,  may  properly  be  sul>ject 
to  central  review.  In  the  light  of  these  considerations,  the 
present  practice  in  retaining  the  appointment  of  certain  classes 
of  local  employees  in  the  hands  of  the  head  of  the  service  at 
Washington,  though  the  initial  selection  remains  with  the  local 
officer,  seems  well  advised. 

Politics  and  Salary  Increases. — One  field  of  personnel  ad- 
ministration in  which  political,  and  particularly  congressional, 
influence  has  traditionally  and  notoriously  been  active  is  that 
of  salary  increases  within  grade,  that  is,  a  mere  increase  of 
salary  not  involving  a  change  of  duties.  There  are  two  rea- 
sons why  this  has  been  a  favorite  point  of  attack  for  those 
with  "influence."  The  first  is  that,  unlike  an  appointment, 
or  promotion  (that  is,  a  change  to  higher  duties),  or  transfer, 
which  can  ordinarily  be  agitated  only  when  a  vacancy  exists, 
the  time  has  always  been  seasonable  for  an  increase  in  salary. 
Again,  in  making  an  appointment,  promotion,  or  transfer,  an 
administrative  officer,  particularly  if  the  position  involves 
supervisory  functions,  must  have  some  regard  to  the  capacity 
for  the  position  of  the  individual  on  whose  behalf  interven- 
tion is  made.  In  the  case  of  salary  increases  no  such  con- 
sideration need  enter.  The  only  administrative  considerations 
which  must  be  heeded  are  the  conservation  of  appropriations 
and  of  the  morale  of  the  working  force. 

In  both  these  respects,  the  federal  personnel  system  has 


154  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

been  fundamentally  defective,  and  still  remains  so,  though 
the  work  of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  discussed  in  a 
subsequent  chapter,^  gives  ground  for  hope  that  a  change  is 
to  come.  In  a  well  ordered  personnel  system,  there  are  only 
certain  dates  when  the  question  of  salary  increases  can  be  con- 
sidered; and  at  that  time  the  claims  of  all  must  be  considered 
on  an  equal  basis.  Moreover,  in  a  well  ordered  system,  there 
are  definite  and  fairly  narrow  limits  above  which  the  salary 
paid  for  any  given  class  of  work  may  not  be  raised;  and  such 
limits  are  not  only  defined  but  enforced  by  a  central  inde- 
pendent authority.  It  is  the  absence  of  such  a  central  definition 
and  enforcement  of  compensation  standards  (and  the  failure, 
in  most  cases  of  departmental  officers  themselves  to  apply  such 
standards)  that  has  made  it  possible  for  variations  of  as  much 
as  lOO  per  cent  in  the  compensation  paid  for  the  same  class 
of  work.  Where  it  is  possible  for  an  administrative  officer 
to  pay  one  $2,000  for  the  same  class  and  grade  of  service  as 
is  being  rendered  by  another  for  $1,000,  it  is  obvious  that 
an  employee  who  has  "influence"  has  a  most  powerful  in- 
centive to  employ  it  as  actively  as  possible.  The  fixation  and 
enforcement  of  compensation  standards,  and  of  procedure  for 
determining  on  an  impartial  basis  the  award  of  periodic  in- 
creases within  the  range  permitted — matters  discussed  from 
the  administrative  standpoint  in  subsequent  chapters  - — will 
end  one  of  the  most  fertile  and  pernicious  sources  of  political 
intervention  in  the  field  of  personnel. 

Political  Pressure  upon  Employees  by  Superior  Officers. 
— Another  manner  in  which  political  considerations  may  in- 
terfere injuriously  in  personnel  matters  is  that  of  the  coercion 
of  employees  by  superior  officers  to  render  political  service  in 
the  form  of  making  contributions  to  the  party's  campaign 
chest  or  the  rendition  of  party  aid  in  other  ways.  Such  coer- 
cion can  be  exerted  through  the  withholding  of  a  deserved 
promotion,  salary  increase,  or  favorable  assignment  in  the 
case  of  recalcitrancy,  or  at  the  worst  through  a  dropping  from 
the  rolls. 

*See  Chapter  VII. 

'  3ee  Chapter  IX  and  Chapter  XV, 


ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICAL  INTERFERENCE    155 

Prohibition    of    Forced    Campaign    Contributions. — The 

dangers  inherent  in  this  situation  were  early  recognized.  At 
the  outset  attention  was  chiefly  directed  toward  the  prevention 
of  forced  contributions  for  poHtical  purposes.  As  is  well 
known,  prior  to  the  enactment  of  legislation  on  the  subject, 
all  federal  employees  were  regularly  levied  upon  by  the  party 
in  power  at  every  election  period.  Failure  to  contribute 
meant,  at  best,  denial  of  all  deserved  promotion  or  salary  in- 
crease, and,  at  worst,  reduction  or  removal. 

The  first  legislation  against  political  contributions  in  the 
civil  service  was  the  act  of  August  15,  1876,  w^hich  provided 
that: 

All  executive  officers  or  employees  of  the  United  States 
not  appointed  by  the  President,  with  the  advice  and  consent 
of  the  Senate,  are  prohibited  from  requesting,  giving  to,  or 
receiving  from,  any  other  officer  or  employee  of  the  Govern- 
ment, any  money  or  property  or  other  thing  of  value  for  po- 
litical purposes;  and  any  such  officer  or  employee,  who  shall 
off'end  against  the  provisions  of  this  section  shall  be  at  once 
discharged  from  the  service  of  the  United  States;  and  he  shall 
also  be  deemed  guilty  of  a  misdemeanor,  and  on  conviction 
thereof  shall  be  fined  in  a  sum  not  exceeding  $500. 

It  does  not  appear  that  this  enactment  had  any  particular 
effect.  It  will  be  noted  that  it  did  not  penalize  the  action  of 
a  presidential  appointee  who  might  request  or  demand  con- 
tributions from  his  subordinates  but  only  penalized  the  action 
of  a  subordinate  in  acceding  to  such  a  demand.  The  slight 
penalty  imposed  by  the  act  was  hardly  calculated  to  break  up 
a  practice  so  deeply  rooted  and  extensive,  nor  were  the  district 
attorneys,  themselves  political  officers,  likely  to  exert  them- 
selves unduly  to  enforce  these  provisions. 

Not  until  the  enactment  of  the  civil  service  act  in  1883 
was  an  effective  statutory  prohibition  secured.  The  last  five  of 
the  15  sections  of  the  act  are  devoted  wholly  to  the  matter  of 
political  contributions,  and  remain  to  this  day  the  whole  of 
the  federal  law  on  this  subject.     Of  these  sections,  the  most 


156  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

material  for  the  present  purpose  are  Sections  ii  and  14. 
Taken  together  their  effect  is  to  prohibit  any  officer  of  the 
United  States,  legislative,  executive,  or  judicial  (except  the 
President)  "from  soliciting  or  receiving  a  contribution  from 
or  giving  a  contribution  to  any  other  officer  or  employee  of 
the  United  States  for  any  political  purpose."  Violation  of 
this  prohibition  is  made  punishable  by  a  fine  not  exceeding 
$5,000  or  by  imprisonment  for  a  term  not  exceeding  three 
years.  This  provision  is  further  enforced,  at  least  morally 
(for  from  a  practical  standpoint  the  reenforcement  is  very 
slight),  by  the  provision  (Section  13)  "that  no  officer  or  em- 
ployee of  the  United  States  mentioned  in  this  act  shall  dis- 
charge or  promote  or  degrade  or  in  any  manner  change  the 
official  rank  or  compensation  of  any  other  officer  or  employee, 
nor  promise  or  threaten  so  to  do  for  giving  or  withholding 
or  neglecting  to  make  any  contribution  of  money  or  any  other 
valuable  thing  for  any  political  purpose." 

From  the  standpoint  of  immediate  and  effective  enforce- 
ment, the  penal  sanction  which  Congress  attached  to  these  pro- 
hibitions would  doubtless  have  remained  relatively  ineffective 
had  it  not  created  at  the  same  time  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission. The  act  provided  that  the  Commission  might  "make 
investigation  .  .  .  concerning  .  .  .  the  action  of  those  in  the 
public  service  in  respect  to  the  execution  of  this  act."  (Sec- 
tion 2,  4.)  The  Commission  was  thus  given  authority  to 
investigate  all  cases  of  political  contributions  levied  or  given 
in  violation  of  the  act,  and  has  displayed  from  the  beginning 
great  persistence  and  energy  in  running  down  any  cases  of 
this  character  brought  to  its  attention. 

The  activities  of  the  Commission  brought  a  considerable, 
indeed  a  tremendous,  improvement  in  the  situation  within  a 
very  few  years  after  the  enactment  of  the  law.  Never  since 
that  time  have  political  assessments  been  levied  in  the  fed- 
eral service  on  anything  like  the  scale  which  prevailed  previ- 
ously. The  history  has  not  been  one  of  continuous  progress, 
however.     Occasionally  with  changes  of  administration  or  of 


ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICAL  INTERFERENCE    157 

local  chief  officers  conditions  have  gone  backward  in  one 
branch  or  another  of  the  service.  On  the  whole,  however, 
progress  has  been  consistent.  It  would  probably  be  too  much 
to  say  that  political  assessments  have  been  completely  and  per- 
manently driven  out  of  the  federal  service ;  but  even  where  they 
may  persist  or  occasionally  be  revived  they  are  no  longer  an 
important  factor  affecting  the  dismissal,  promotion,  etc.,  of 
any  large  body  of  employees.^ 

It  is  impossible  to  examine  the  abstracts  of  the  Commis- 
sion's investigations  of  cases  of  violation  of  the  statutes 
against  political  assessments,  which  are  a  regular  feature  of 
the  Commission's  annual  reports,  without  being  driven 
strongly  to  the  conclusion  that  this  statute  has  hardly  ever 
received  from  district  attorneys,  or  even  from  the  Attorney 
General,  that  vigorous  and  impartial  enforcement  which  is 
traditionally  awarded  to  all  federal  statutes.  Case  after  case 
is  to  be  found  in  the  Commission's  records  in  which  a  clear 
and  deliberate  violation  of  the  statute  appears  to  have  been 
made  out,  but  which,  if  taken  up  at  all  by  the  Department  of 
Justice,  was  so  feebly  handled  that  either  no  indictment  was 
secured  or  an  acquittal  resulted.  The  obvious  explanation  is 
that  the  district  attorney  is  generally  a  member  of  the  same 
political  party  as  the  officer  whose  prosecution  is  sought.  In 
view  of  the  record  it  is  at  least  worth  considering  whether 
the  Civil  Service  Commission  should  not  be  vested  with  in- 
dependent powers  of  presentation  and  prosecution  on  cases  of 
this  kind,  such  power  to  be  exercised  by  it  whenever,  in  its 

*  The  effect  of  the  statute  was  greatly  strengthened  by  the  decision 
handed  down  in  1913  by  the  United  States  Court  for  the  Western  District 
of  Pennsylvania  in  the  case  of  the  United  States  v.  Dutro.  In  this  case 
it  was  held  that  if  a  federal  officer  received  contributions  from  federal 
employees  and  delivered  or  used  them  for  political  purposes,  he  would  be 
"concerned  in  receiving"  them  and  would  be  guilty  of  violation  of  the 
statute.  The  fact  that  the  defendant  "did  so  without  any  thought  that  he 
was  violating  any  statute  and  felt  that  he  was  acting  purely  as  a  conveyor 
of  these  contributions  to  the  political  parties  for  whom  they  were  intended, 
to  accommodate  those  who  were  making  the  contributions,  and  purely  as  a 
personal  matter"  did  not  absolve  him  from  guilt.  The  principle  appears 
to  be  definitely  established,  therefore,  that  a  defendant  may  no  longer 
escape  punishment  by  alleging  that  he  received  a  political  contribution  as 
a  mere  agent  or  messenger  for  the  purpose  of  turning  it  over  to  a  political 
organization. 


158  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

judgment,  the  local  prosecuting  officer  of  the  government  is 
not  ^vholeheartedly  seeking  a  conviction. 
Prohibition  of  Forced  Political  Services. — Coercion  ma>^ 
be  exerted  by  a  superior  officer  not  merely  to  extort  a  con- 
tribution from  the  employee  but  to  extort  political  service  of 
one  kind  or  another.  To  coercion  of  this  type  the  civil  serv- 
ice act  offers  no  effective  opposition  or  restriction,  nor  has  any 
subsequent  statute  done  so.  The  act  indeed  lays  down  the 
principle  "that  no  person  in  the  public  service  is  for  that  rea- 
son under  any  obligation  to  render  any  political  service  and 
that  he  will  not  be  removed  or  otherwise  prejudiced  for  re- 
fusing to  do  so";  (Section  2,  Second,  Fifth)  and  the  rules 
provide  that  "no  person  in  the  executive  civil  service  shall 
use  his  official  authority  or  influence  for  the  purpose  of  in- 
terfering with  an  election  or  affecting  the  results  thereof" 
(Rule  I,  i),  a  provision  which  has  been  interpreted  by  the 
Commission  as  prohibiting  a  superior  officer  from  requesting 
or  requiring  the  rendition  of  any  political  service  or  the  per- 
formance of  political  work  of  any  sort  by  subordinates.  But 
there  is  no  penal  sanction  behind  this  will,  and  its  effective 
enforcement  depends  upon  the  desire  of  the  President  and  the 
department  heads  to  cooperate. 

To  what  extent  employees  are  actually  called  upon  by  po- 
litical superiors  to  perform  political  service  it  is  difficult  to 
say.  In  view,  however,  of  the  relatively  insignificant  num- 
ber of  complaints  on  this  hand  which  reach  the  Commission, 
it  seems  fairly  clear  that  violations  of  the  rule  are  relatively 
infrequent. 

Like  the  local  federal  prosecuting  officers,  the  depart- 
mental authorities  also  have  too  frequently  displayed  an  ex- 
cessive tenderness  towards  the  superior  officer  who  has  been 
detected  by  the  Commission  in  a  violation  of  the  law  prohibit- 
ing political  assessments  or  of  the  rule  prohibiting  political 
discrimination.  The  Commission  consequently,  on  several  oc- 
casions, has  recommended  to  the  President  that  the  rules  be 
so  amended  as  to  make  it  mandatory  upon  the  departments  to 
act  in  accordance  with  the  recommendation  of  the  Commission 


ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICAL  INTERFERENCE    159 

in  any  matter  involving  the  violation  of  these  provisions  of 
the  law  and  rules,  such  recommendation  to  be  subject  to  re- 
view only  by  the  President.  It  is  hard  to  see  any  objection 
to  this  proposal.  It  is  not  open  to  the  exception  which  may 
be  taken  to  the  injection  of  an  outside  body  into  the  matter  of 
removals  or  punishments  in  the  service  generally,  as  dividing 
responsibility  for  administration.  Here  the  responsibility  for 
the  enforcement  of  the  law  and  rules  is  primarily  upon  the 
Civil  Service  Commission.  Indeed,  it  is  rather  the  present 
arrangement  which  divides  responsibility  in  that  while  the 
Commission  is  supposed  to  be  responsible  for  the  enforcement 
of  the  law  and  rules  it  has  no  effective  means  of  discharging 
that  responsibility  but  is  at  the  mercy  of  the  departmental 
officers. 

Prohibition  of  Coercion  by  Persons  Outside  the  Service. 
— Manifestly  the  official  superiors  of  an  employee  are  not  the 
only  persons  in  a  position  to  coerce  him  to  make  political 
contributions  or  to  render  other  political  service.  Equally  ef- 
fective is  coercion  exercised  by  a  person  not  holding  any  of- 
ficial position  but  known  by  the  employee  to  be  of  authority 
or  power  in  the  party  organization  to  which  the  political 
superior  officer  belongs.  A  threat  of  demotion  or  dismissal 
or  a  promise  of  promotion  by  such  an  individual  would  be 
fully  as  effective  a  means  of  coercing  the  employee  as  a  threat 
or  promise  by  the  superior  officer  himself. 

It  might  be  thought,  therefore,  that  Congress  had  extended 
to  the  employee  the  same  statutory  protection  against  the  pos- 
sibility of  coercion  by  persons  of  this  type  that  it  has  against 
coercion  by  superior  officers.  The  only  statutory  provision, 
however,  which  condemns  such  coercion  is  that  of  the  civil 
service  act,  "that  no  person  shall  in  any  room  or  building 
occupied  in  the  discharge  of  official  duties  by  any  officer  or 
employee  of  the  United  States  mentioned  in  this  act  or  in  any 
navy  yard,  fort,  or  arsenal,  solicit  in  any  manner  whatever 
or  receive  any  contribution  of  money  or  any  other  thing  of 
value  for  any  political  purpose  whatever."      (Section  12.) 

Both  the  Courts  and  the  Commission  have  given  to  this 


i6o  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

prohibition  the  widest  possible  interpretation ;  ^  but  by  no 
stretch  of  interpretation  can  it  be  extended  to  cover  a  visit  by 
the  party  worker  to  the  employee  at  his  home. 

The  Commission  has  recommended  repeatedly  to  Congress 
a  statute  which  would  prohibit  the  solicitation  of  a  political 
contribution  from  an  officer  or  employee  in  the  Government 
by  any  person  whatsoever,  but  the  proposal  has  never  received 
any  consideration  from  Congress.  The  enactment  would  seem 
to  be  plainly  called  for,  and  should  cover,  moreover,  the  solici- 
tation of  political  service  of  any  kind. 

Restrictions  on  Voluntary  Political  Activity. — In  contrast 
to  the  question  of  the  coercion  of  the  employee  into  rendering 
political  contributions  or  service,  the  question  of  the  restric- 
tions, if  any,  which  shall  be  placed  upon  his  voluntary  activities 
is  indeed  a  difficult  one.  The  line  between  contributions  or 
service  rendered  as  the  result  of  coercion  and  that  which 
is  really  voluntary  may  be  and  often  is  impossible  to 
draw.  No  word  of  threat  or  promise  may  be  spoken  by  the 
superior  officer,  yet  the  employee  may  know  perfectly  well 
that  a  contribution  or  activity  on  his  part  will  earn  its  due 
reward  and  conversely  that  failure  to  contribute,  or  inactivity, 

^  The  Commission  by  a  minute  adopted  ]\Iarch  23,  1897,  held  that 
addressing  a  letter  to  a  government  employee  in  a  government  building 
soliciting  political  contributions  is  a  solicitation  in  that  building  within  the 
meaning  of  section  12  of  the  civil  service  act.  and  in  this  opinion  was  sus- 
tained by  the  advice  of  eminent  counsel  (See  14th  Report,  pp.  147-155), 
but  notwithstanding  numerous  violations  no  opportunity  arose  of  having 
the  question  judicially  determined  until  rgo7,  when  an  indictment  was 
obtained  against  Edward  S.  Thayer  at  Dallas,  Texas.  A  demurrer  was 
interposed  to  the  indictment  and  was  sustained  on  the  ground  that  the 
act  required  the  personal  presence  in  the  government  building  of  the 
solicitor.  Appeal  was  taken  to  the  Supreme  Court,  and  the  judgment  of 
the  lower  court  was  reversed.  (United  States  v.  Thayer,  209  U.  S.,  39.) 
Tbe  opinion  of  the  court,  wliich  was  delivered  by  Justice  Holmes  on 
March  9,  1908,  establishes  definitely  the  proposition  that  solicitation  by 
letter  or  circular  addressed  to  and  delivered  liy  mail  or  otherwise  to  an 
officer  or  em])loyee  of  the  United  States  at  the  office  or  building  in  which 
he  is  employed  in  the  discharge  of  his  official  duties  is  a  solicitation  "in 
a  room  or  building"  within  the  meaning  of  this  section,  the  solicitation 
taking  place  where  the  letter  was  received.  (See  also  United  States  v. 
Smith,  163  ¥q(\.  926,  where  the  letter  was  personally  delivered.) 

The  Commission  holds  that  the  sending  through  the  mails  of  letters 
to  government  employees  soliciting  contriliutions,  and  omitting  the  street 
or  home  address  from  the  envelopes  with  the  result  that  the  letters  are 
delivered  by  the  postal  authorities  in  the  government  building  in  which 
they  are  employed,  constitutes  a  violation  of  this  section. 


ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICAL  INTERFERENCE    i6i 

will  bring  swift  and  sure  retribution.  So  long,  therefore,  as 
the  chief  officers  are  political  appointees,  particularly  in  local 
offices,  it  is  next  to  impossible  to  be  sure  that  any  political 
activity  on  an  employee's  part  is  purely  voluntary — that  is  to 
say,  is  rendered  without  any  prospect  or  hope  of  reward  or  any 
fear  of  punishment. 

Consequently,  in  the  attempt  completely  to  eliminate  poli- 
tics from  public  personnel  systems,  the  only  practicable  course 
has  seemed  to  many  to  be  virtually  complete  prohibition  of 
political  activity  on  the  part  of  non-political  employees.  This 
radical  step  was  taken  in  the  federal  service  in  1907,  when 
the  rules  were  amended  by  President  Roosevelt  to  provide 
that  "persons  ...  in  the  competitive  classified  service  while 
retaining  the  right  to  vote  and  to  express  privately  their  opin- 
ions on  all  political  subjects  shall  take  no  active  part  in  political 
management  or  in  political  campaigns,"  ^  and  by  subsequent 

*  This  rule  is  subject  to  the  following  exceptions:  "Whenever  in  the 
opinion  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Navy  a  strict  enforcement  of  the  pro- 
visions of  section  i,  Rule  I,  of  the  civil  service  rules  would  influence  the 
result  of  a  local  election  the  issue  of  which  materially  affects  the  local 
welfare  of  the  Government  employees  in  the  vicinity  of  any  navy  yard  or 
station,  the  Civil  Service  Commission  may,  on  recommendation  of  the 
Secretary  of  the  Navy,  and  after  such  investigation  as  it  may  deem  neces- 
sary, permit  the  active  participation  of  the  employees  of  the  yard  or 
station  in  such  local  election.  In  the  exercise  of  the  privilege  which  may 
be  conferred  hereunder,  persons  affected  must  not  neglect  their  ofificial 
duties  nor  cause  public  scandal  by  their  activity."  (Executive  Order,  May 
14,  1909.) 

"Employees  of  the  executive  civil  service  permanently  residing  in  the 
following  incorporated  municipalities  adjacent  to  the  District  of  Columbia 
will  not  be  prohibited  from  becoming  candidates  for  or  holding  municipal 
office  in  such  corporations  : 

"In  Maryland — Takoma  Park,  Kensington,  Garrett  Park,  Chevy  Chase, 
Glen  Echo,  Hyattsville,  Mount  Rainier,  Somerset,  Capitol  Heights,  Laurel. 

"In  Virginia — Falls   Church,  Vienna,  Herndon. 

"Employees  of  the  executive  civil  service,  qualified  to  vote  at  a  munici- 
pal election  of  the  town  of  North  Beach,  Maryland  (a  summer  resort, 
practically  uninhabited  during  eight  months  of  the  year,  and  inhabited 
during  the  other  four  months  almost  exclusively  by  residents  of  Washing- 
ton), will  not  be  prohibited  from,  becoming  candidates  for  or  holding 
municipal  office  in  or  under  such  town  of  North  Beach,  Maryland. 

"This  order,  which  is  recommended  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission, 
is  based  upon  the  facts  that  a  considerable  number  of  the  residents  and 
taxpayers  of  the  towns  mentioned  are  employed  in  the  Government  service, 
that  service  as  municipal  officers  in  such  town  should  in  no  way  involve 
general  partisan  political  activity,  and  that  the  principle  of  home  rule  and 
local  self-government  justifies  such  participation."  (Executive  Order, 
February  14,  1912,  as  amended  by  Orders  of  May  S,  1914,  May  26,  1914, 
and  March  9,  1818.) 


i62  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

departmental  regulations  similar  limitations  have  been  placed 
on  unclassified  laborers. 

Pursuant  to  its  general  power  to  "make  investigations  and 
report  upon  all  matters  touching  the  enforcement  and  effect 
of  said  rules,"  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  since  1907,  has 
investigated  scores  of  cases  of  political  activity.  In  these  in- 
vestigations the  phrase  "active  part  in  political  management 
or  in  political  campaigns"  has  been  given  a  very  wide  mean- 
ing by  the  Commission.  Some  of  the  forms  of  activity  which 
the  Commission  has  thus  held  to  be  forbidden  by  this  pro- 
vision of  the  rule  are  : 

1.  Candidacy   for  service   as   delegate,  alternate,  or  proxy   in   any 

political  convention  or  as  an  officer  or  employee  of  the  same. 

2.  Service  on  or  for  any  political  committee  or  similar  organization. 

3.  Service   in  preparing   for,   organizing,   or   conducting   a  political 

meeting  or  rally,  addressing  such  a  meeting,  or  taking  any 
other  active  part  in  the  same. 

4.  Engaging  in  political  discussions  or  conferences  while  on  duty 

or  in  public  places. 

5.  Canvassing  a  district  or  soliciting  political  support  for  any  party, 

faction,  candidate,  or  measure. 

6.  Offensive   activity   at   primary   and    regular   elections,    soliciting 

votes,  assisting  voters  to  mark  ballots,  or  in  getting  out  the 
voters  on  registration  or  election  days,  acting  as  accredited 
checker,  watcher,  or  challenger  of  any  party  or  faction  or 
assisting  in  counting  the  vote  or  engaging  in  any  other  activity 
at  the  polls  except  the  marking  and  depositing  of  his  own 
ballot. 

7.  Rendering  service   for  pay,  such  as  transporting  voters  to  and 

from  the  polls  and  candidates  on  convassing  tours  even  though 
rendered  without  regard  to  political  party. 

8.  Service  as  an  election  officer,  except  in  positions  in  which  refusal 

to  serve  is  penalized  by  the  election  law  of  the  state. 

9.  Connection  editorially,  managerially,  or  financially  with  any  po- 

litical newspaper  or  writing  for  publication  or  publishing  any 
letter  or  article,  signed  or  unsigned,  in  favor  of  or  against  any 
political  party,  candidate  or  faction,  or  measure. 

10.  Soliciting,    collecting,    receiving,    or    otherwise    handling    or    dis- 

bursing political  contributions. 

11.  Candidacy  for  a  nomination  or  for  election  to  any  national,  state, 

county,  or  municipal  office.^ 

*  The  actual  holdinir  of  local  office  prohil)itod  by  Executive  Order  of 
January  17,  1873,  is  applicable  to  all  federal  employees,  including  presi- 
dential appointees  and  laljorers.     The  order  is  as  follows : 


ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICAL  INTERFERENCE    163 

12.  Betting  or  wagering  upon  the   results  of   primary   and  general 

elections. 

13.  Service  as  a  legislative   agent  or  lobbyist   and   all   activities   in 

connection  with  direct  legislation  and  proposed  constitutional 
or  statutory  provisions,  national  or  state,  and  with  proposed 
municipal  ordinances,  regulations,  and  other  enactments. 

14.  Distributing  campaign  literature,  badges  or  buttons  and  wearing 

such  badges  or  buttons  while  on  duty. 

15.  Circulating  political  petitions. 

16.  Accepting  political  leadership  or  becoming  prominently  identified 

with  any  political  movement,  party  or  faction. 

"Persons  holding  any  federal  civil  office  by  appointment  under  the 
Constitution  and  laws  of  the  United  States  will  be  expected,  while  holding 
such  office,  not  to  accept  or  hold  any  office  under  any  State  or  Territorial 
government,  or  under  the  charter  or  ordinances  of  any  municipal  corpora- 
tion ;  and,  further,  that  the  acceptance  or  continued  holding  of  any  such 
State,  Territorial,  or  municipal  office,  whether  elective  or  by  appointment, 
by  any  person  holding  civil  office  as  aforesaid  under  the  Government  of 
the  United  States,  other  than  judicial  offices  under  the  Constitution  of 
the  United  States,  will  be  decm.ed  a  vacation  of  the  federal  office  held  by 
such  person,  and  will  be  taken  to  be  and  will  be  treated  as  a  resignation 
by  such  federal  officers  of  his  commission  or  appointment  in  the  service  of 
the  United  States." 

By  this  order  and  by  a  supplementary  order  issued  January  28,  1873, 
the  following  local  offices  are  excepted  from  the  rule : 

1.  Oflfices  of  justices  of  the  peace,  or  notaries  public,  and  of  com- 
missioners to  take  acknowledgment  of  deeds,  of  bail,  or  to  administer 
oaths. 

2.  Deputy  marshals  of  the  United  States,  when  these  offices  are  con- 
ferred upon  sheriffs  or  deputy  sheriffs. 

3.  Positions  and  service  on  boards  of  education,  school  committees, 
public  libraries,  religious,  or  eleemosynary  institutions  incorporated  or 
established  or  sustained  by  state  or  municipal  authority. 

4.  Officers  of  the  state  or  territorial  militia. 

5.  Unpaid  sei-vice  in  local  or  municipal  fire  departments. 

By  subsequent  orders  the  following  have  also  been  excepted : 

1.  Employees  on  Indian  reservations,  appointed  under  state  authority 
as  deputy  sheriffs  or  constables,  as  the  requirements  of  the  service  demand. 

2.  Small  salaried  positions  in  municipal  fire  departments. 

3.  State  and  territorial  positions  by  officers  and  employees  of  the 
Department  of  Agriculture  if  deemed  necessary  by  the  Secretary  of  Agri- 
culture to  secure  a  more  efficient  administration  (Executive  Order,  June 
26,  1907). 

4.  Special  agencies  under  the  Bureau  of  the  Census  when  conferred 
upon  state  and  county  officials  for  the  collection  of  cotton  statistics 
(Executive  Order,  Aug.  4,   1909). 

5.  Temporary  office  of  moderator  of  a  town  meeting  and  offices  of  a 
like  character  (Executive  Order,  Aug.  24,  1912). 

6.  Deputy  state  fish  or  game  wardens'  positions,  without  compensa- 
tion, if  conferred  upon  employees  of  the  Reclamation  Service  and  the 
National  Park  Service,  with  the  approval  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior 
(Executive  Order,  July  9,    1914)- 

7.  Appointments  of  employees  of  the  Treasury  Department,  with  the 
approval  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  on  state,  county,  or  municipal 
councils  of  defense  for  purposes  of  mobilizing  and  conserving  the  re- 
sources of  the  country  (Executive  Order,  April  14,  1917)- 


i64  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

The  rule  docs  not  prohibit  employees  in  the  classified  serv- 
ice from : 

1.  Attendance  as  spectators  at  conventions,  attending  and  voting  at 

primary  meetings,  caucuses,  political  committees,  and  similar 
occasions  provided  the  employees  do  not  participate  in  the 
deliberations,  address  them,  act  as  officers,  or  take  a  prominent 
part  in  the  same. 

2.  Membership    in   political   clubs   provided   the   employees    are    not 

officers,  committee  members,  or  delegates  or  representatives  to 
other  organizations. 

3.  Making  political  contributions  to  any  committee,  organization,  or 
.    person  not  employed  by  the  United  States. 

4.  Candidacy  of  an  employee  for  promotion  or  transfer  to  an  un- 

classified office,  with  the  consent  of  his  department,  provided 
he  does  not  use  his  official  authority  or  influence  in  political 
matters,  neglects  his  duty,  causes  public  scandal,  or  semblance 
of  coercion  upon  his  fellow  employees. 

The  rule  does  not  specifically  prohibit  classified  employees 
from  making  contributions  for  political  purposes,  and  the 
Commission  has  not  interpreted  it  as  embracing  such  con- 
tributions. Nor  has  the  Commission  ever  recommended  that 
the  rule  be  so  extended.  It  is  difficut  to  see,  however,  why 
the  actual  contribution  of  cash  does  not  fall  more  clearly  under 
the  head  of  "active  part  in  political  management  or  in  po- 
litical campaigns"  than  do  some  of  the  things  proscribed  by 
the  Commission. 

The  failure  of  President  Roosevelt  to  include  the  making 
of  political  contributions  in  the  rule  is  doubtless  to  be  explained 
by  the  fact  that  what  appears  to  have  been  in  his  mind  was 
principally  the  prevention  of  a  public  display  of  partisanship 
by  the  employee  which  he  regarded  as  unseemly,  rather  than 
the  suppression  of  political  influence  in  the  administration  of 
the  personnel  system  itself. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  in  a  letter  to  the  Civil  Service 
Commission  under  date  of  June  13,  1902,  in  which  he  first 
laid  down  in  almost  identical  wording  the  principle  which 
he  afterwards  incorporated  into  the  rule,  President  Roosevelt 
advanced  as  the  reason  for  prohibiting  classified  employees 
from  political  activity  merely  that  they  were  "precisely  the 


ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICAL  INTERFERENCE    165 

same  reasons  that  a  judge,  an  army  officer,  a  regular  soldier, 
or  a  policeman  is  debarred  from  taking  such  active  part."  To 
point  out  the  fundamental  respects  in  which  the  ordinary  clas- 
sified employee  differs  from  a  judge,  or  from  any  member  of 
the  armed  forces  of  the  state,  in  his  relation  to  the  political 
government,  would  be  to  expound  the  obvious.  It  is  believed 
that  so  far  as  classified  employees  are  concerned  the  only  real 
justification  for  the  drastic  prohibition  of  political  activity  now 
found  is  the  need  for  the  complete  suppression  of  all  possi- 
bilities of  the  entrance  of  political  factors.  Did  not  the  rea- 
son here  advanced  exist,  that  is  to  say,  were  the  personnel 
system  so  thoroughly  safeguarded  from  politics  that  political 
activity  on  the  part  of  the  employee  could  redound  in  no  pos- 
sible way  to  his  advantage  in  the  service  or  the  failure  to  be 
politically  active  work  to  his  disadvantage,  it  is  difficult  to 
see  why  there  would  be  any  impropriety  in  an  engineer,  a  phy- 
sician, a  clerk  or  any  other  non-political  employee  of  the  fed- 
eral government  taking  fully  as  active  a  part  in  political  life 
as  any  other  citizen. 

Looked  at  from  any  angle,  the  limitations  upon  the  rights 
of  political  activity  now  enforced  in  the  federal  service  are  an 
extremely  severe  infringement  upon  the  personal  liberty  of 
the  employee  and  are  to  be  justified  only  by  the  overpowering 
necessities  of  the  personnel  system.  The  mere  appearance  of 
unseemliness  would  hardly  constitute  sufficient  ground  upon 
which  to  abrogate  the  political  rights  of  several  hundred  thou- 
sand citizens. 

The  Civil  Service  Commission  from  the  first  has  been  a 
staunch '  supporter  of  the  rule  under  discussion,  as  may  be 
judged  from  the  comprehensive  meaning  which  it  has  given 
to  the  term  "active  part  in  political  management  or  political 
campaigns."  The  Commission  has  never  published  an  ex- 
press statement  of  the  reasons  which  it  believes  to  justify 
the  rule.  It  is  believed,  however,  that  were  such  a  statement 
to  be  issued,  the  Commission's  endorsement  would  rest  rather 
upon  the  grounds  here  taken — the  impossibility  in  the  political 
conditions  now  surrounding  the  service  of  preventing  coercion 


i66  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

by  superior  officers  by  any  means  other  than  this  rule — rather 
than  upon  the  grounds  apparently  had  in  mind  by  President 
Roosevelt  in  promulgating  the  order. 

So  long  as  the  chief  officers  of  the  government,  especially 
in  the  local  establishments,  continue  to  be  selected  upon  a  po- 
litical b'asis  instead  of  upon  merit,  and  so  long  as  adequate 
pi-ocedu'res,  particularly  in  the  field  of  promotion,  salary  in- 
crease, removal,  demotion,  and  the  like  have  not  been  developed 
in  the  service  to  minimize  the  possibility  that  these  processes 
will  be  governed  by  political  considerations,  it  is  difficult  to  see 
how  the  present  restrictions  on  the  political  activity  of  classi- 
fied employees  can  be  dispensed  with  without  grave  danger  of 
a  gradual  but  certain  return  of  that  political  influence  which 
the  enforcement  of  this  rule  had  undoubtedly  done  a  great  deal 
to  suppress.  The  rule  is  thus  to  be  regarded  at  the  present 
time  as  a  necessary  evil. 

The  removal  of  all  restrictions  upon  the  political  activities 
of  employees  is  one  of  the  demands  of  the  National  Federation 
of  Federal  Employees.  It  is  not,  however,  a  demand  which 
has  been  or  is  likely  to  be  pressed  vigorously ;  and  one  gathers 
the  impression  that  it  has  been  placed  in  the  Federation's 
program  rather  as  an  expression  of  a  sentimental  objection  on 
the  part  of  the  employees  to  any  restrictions  upon  their  political 
rights  as  citizens  than  to  a  well  defined  intention  to  effect  their 
removal.  Similarly  the  so-called  reconstruction  program  of 
the  American  Federation  of  Labor,  adopted  at  its  annual  con- 
vention in  1919,  declared  that  public  employees  "must  not  be 
limited  to  the  exercise  of  their  rights  as  citizens."  No  prac- 
tical step  has  yet  been  taken,  however,  by  either  organization 
for  the  abrogation  of  present  restrictions. 

In  addition  to  the  restrictions  upon  the  activity  of  classi- 
fied employees  and  unclassified  laborers  there  are  certain  re- 
strictions enforced  upon  the  political  activity  even  of  the  po- 
litical officers  of  the  Government  (other  than  those  bearing 
upon  the  coercion  of  subordinates  already  reviewed).  These 
regulations,  which  are  in  the  form  of  executive  orders,  have 
a  moral  rather  than  a  legal  force.     Their  main  purpose  is  to 


ELIMINATION  OF  POLITICAL  INTERFERENCE    167 

prevent  the  exhibition  by  federal  office  holders  of  "offensive 
partisanship."  Into  a  discussion  of  these  regulations  or  canons 
of  conduct  it  is  not  relevant  to  enter  here ;  for  they  are  intended 
not  to  safeguard  the  personnel  system,  but  rather  to  maintain 
the  proper  relation  of  the  political  administration  to  the  citi- 
zenship. 


PART  II 

THE  PROBLEM  OF  FEDERAL  PERSONNEL 
ADMINISTRATION 

CHAPTER  VI 

INTRODUCTION 

The  technical,  positive  problem  of  personnel  administra- 
tion in  the  federal  service  is,  in  many  respects,  merely  a  spe- 
cial phase  of  the  general  problem  of  personnel  administration, 
as  encountered  in  all  large  organizations,  private  as  well  as 
governmental.  In  public  serv^ices,  however,  there  are  certain 
factors  not  encountered  in  private  enterprises ;  and  in  the  tech- 
nical branches  of  the  federal  service  special  factors  are  pres- 
ent that  are  not  encountered  in  states  or  municipalities.  No 
program  of  personnel  administration  for  the  federal  service 
can  be  successful  which  ignores  these  factors,  and  an  attempt 
to  force  upon  the  service  personnel  methods  derived  from  other 
and  dissimilar  fields,  without  giving  due  weight  to  these  spe- 
cial factors,  is  doomed  to  failure. 

Special  Factors  in  the  Federal  Personnel  Problem. — The 
need  of  shaping  the  methods  of  recruitment  primarily  with  an 
eye  to  excluding  political  considerations  in  selection  common 
to  all  public  personnel  systems,  and  the  need  still  found  in  the 
federal  service  of  safeguarding  the  exercise  of  administrative 
discretion  in  all  other  personnel  matters,  are  not  the  sole  re- 
spects in  which  the  problem  in  the  federal  service  differs  from 
that  of  private  enterprise.  The  absence  of  the  profit  factor 
in  governmental  operations  is  a  prime  difference.  On  the 
one  hand,  this  makes  for  a  less  vigorous  and  ruthless  appli- 
cation of  the  principles  anc)/inetho)ds  dictated  by  an  impersonal 

i6i 


INTRODUCTION  169 

calculation  of  operating  efficiency.  The  tendency,  unless  spe- 
cial measures  are  taken  to  combat  it,  will  be  for  the  admin- 
istrative officer  in  the  public  service  to  be  influenced  more 
largely  by  consideration  for  the  employee  than  by  considera- 
tion for  the  good  of  the  service,  if  the  two  come  into  conflict. 
From  still  another  standpoint  the  absence  of  the  element  of 
profit  is  of  primary  importance.  The  commercial  enterprise 
in  a  competitive  field  must  maintain  a  certain  standard  of  ef- 
ficiency, which  implies  a  certain  standard  of  personnel,  or  it 
will  cease  to  exist.  Hence  a  private  enterprise  in  a  competi- 
tive field  may  not  reduce  the  attractiveness  of  the  conditions 
of  service  below  the  prevailing  level  without  losing  its  better 
personnel  and  facing  failure.  A  public  service,  however,  may 
continue  to  exist  almost  indefinitely  despite  a  sub-standard 
personnel.  The  public  service  thus  possesses  no  automatic 
check  against  the  development  and  persistence  of  sub-standard 
conditions;  and  such  a  development  must  consequently  be  ex- 
pressly and  plan  fully  guarded  against. 

The  monopolistic  nature  of  many  of  the  activities  of  the 
public  service,  which  is  especially  characteristic  of  the  federal 
service  is  another  closely  related  matter.  In  competitive  pri- 
vate enterprise  if  the  conditions  of  employment  become  un- 
favorable, the  better  employees  find  other  places,  and  thus  a 
symptom  becomes  apparent  which  generally  leads  to  correction.. 
In  many  branches  of  the  federal  organization  no  such  general 
withdrawal  takes  place.  The  personnel  of  long  service  in  those 
organizations,  however  valuable  to  the  government  and  how- 
ever deserving  of  reward  at  its  hands,  may  be  retained  almost 
indefinitely,  if  the  government  chooses,  though  not,  of  course, 
at  a  maximum  of  usefulness,  despite  wholly  unjust  conditions 
of  employment,  simply  because  these  employees  have  no  other 
market  for  their  peculiar  experience.  Unless  special  provi- 
sion is  made  to  prevent  such  a  development,  these  classes  of 
employees  in  a  public  service  almost  invariably  suffer  in  their 
conditions  of  employment  over  a  long  period  as  compared  with 
those  classes  of  employees  whose  experience  in  the  public  serv- 
ice is  an  asset,  or  at  least  not  a  liability,  in  the  business  world. 


I70  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

The  failure  to  take  such  special  measures  in  the  federal  service 
is  reflected  in  the  wholly  unjust  relative  conditions  of  com- 
pensation prevailing  in  the  administrative  and  specialized  cler- 
ical as  opposed  to  the  mechanical  and  labor  positions  in  the 
federal  service. 

The  political  appointment  and  the  resulting  short  and  un- 
certain tenure  of  the  heads  and  assistant  heads  of  the  executive 
departments  and  of  many  of  the  bureau  chiefs  and  local  chief 
officers  is  a  factor  which  makes  of  particular  importance  a 
principle  of  personnel  administration  which  should  control  in 
all  large  organizations,  whether  public  or  private.  Too  much 
reliance  should  not  be  placed  upon  unwritten  law,  which  leaves 
the  shaping  of  practice  and  procedure  largely  in  the  hands  of 
the  administrative  officer.*'  If  a  practice  has  proved  its  worth, 
it  should  be  published  with  due  formality  and  made  of  per- 
manent record  and  should  be  regarded  as  constituting  a  part 
of  the  understanding  of  the  management  with  the  employees 
as  to  the  conditions  of  employment,  to  be  changed  or  departed 
from  thereafter,  especially  if  in  any  way  unfavorable  from 
the  employees'  standpoint,  only  for  compelling  reasons  and 
under  proper  conditions  of  publicity.  Because  of  the  brevity 
of  tenure  of  the  political  administrative  officers  and  the  need 
for  protection  against  political  influences  and  for  enlisting  pub- 
lic confidence  in  the  fairness  of  the  system,  a  greater  degree 
of  formalization  of  method  may  be  required  in  respect  to  cer- 
tain personnel  practices  in  the  federal  service  than  would  be 
required  in  the  case  of  private  organizations. 
'^  A  further  factor  which  distinguishes  the  problem  of  pub- 
lic employment  from  that  of  private  employment  is  the  popular 
feeling,  deeply  rooted,  that  the  administration  of  the  public 
personnel  system  should  work  with  justice  and  fairness  towards 
all  members  of  the  community.  The  outstanding  phase  of 
this  belief  is  that  every  one  has  an  equal  right  to  enter  public 
employment,  and  that  consequently  the  methods  of  selection 
must  be  such  as  will  not  merely  insure  the  selection  of  the 
most  capable,  but  give  to  every  person  an  equal  opportunity 
to  demonstrate  his  qualifications  and  to  receive  recognition  in 


INTRODUCTION  171 

exact  accordance  therewith.  Not  only  in  the  matter  of  ap- 
pointment does  this  feehng  manifest  itself.  In  every  phase 
of  public  personnel  administration,  in  promotion,  transfer, 
lay-off,  and  the  like,  it  is  equally  general. 

Closely  related  to,  and  yet  quite  distinct  from  the  require- 
ment of  obvious  distributive  justice  is  the  principle  that  in 
the  selection  of  personnel  for  service  at  Washington  the  se- 
vere political  divisions  of  the  country  should  be  given  equal 
or  proportional  recognition.  This  principle  has  long  had 
recognition  in  the  federal  personnel  system,  having  been  pre- 
scribed by  the  civil  service  law.  In  existing  practice  the  state 
is  the  unit  employed  in  thus  apportioning  geographically  the 
posts  at  Washington,  but  the  proposal  has  even  been  pressed 
that  each  Congressional  district  should  be  recognized  as  a 
distinct  claimant  for  a  share.  There  are  doubtless  reasons 
why  the  recruitment  of  federal  employees  at  Washington  too 
exclusively  from  certain  sections  of  the  country  is  undesirable, 
but  it  is  equally  obvious  that  if  pushed  beyond  reasonable  lim- 
its, this  desire  to  apportion  the  membership  of  the  adminis- 
trative personnel  geographically  may  become  a  serious  obstacle 
to  efficient  personnel  administration.  At  its  proper  place  the 
existing  practice  of  the  government  in  this  respect  is  examined 
fully.  Here  it  is  desired  merely  to  point  to  this  as  an  addjj  ^ 
tional  element  which  complicates  the  problem  of  federal j3gr- 
sonnel  administration. 

Finally,  it  is  not  sufficient  merely  that  the  personnel  meth- 
ods of  the  government  should  work  substantial  justice  as  be- 
tween aspirants  for  appointment  or  promotion.  The  fact  that 
they  do  so  work  must  be  made  apparent  to  the  public ;  a  gen- 
eral belief  must  \tt  developed  that  the  methods  employed  are 
as  impersonal  and  fair  as  they  are  in  fact.  Such  a  belief  is 
vitally  necessary  to  the  fullest  development  of  the  federal  per-  y^ 
sonnel  system.  Without  it  the  service  loses  immensely  in  its 
attractiveness  to  the  self-respecting  worker.  Nothing  is  more 
trying  to  the  government  employee  than  to  encounter  In  his 
daily  contacts  a  Ix^lief  that  the  system  of  which  he  is  a  part 
is  overrun,  or  even  tainted,  with  favoritism  and   injustice. 


172  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

That  this  belief  may  be  without  real  foundation  hardly  makes 
its  existence  any  less  distasteful.  Even  more  serious  perhaps 
is  its  effect  on  recruitment.  Unquestionably  able  applicants 
have  been  deterred  in  many  cases  from  attempting  to  enter 
the  federal  service  by  an  obscure  feeling,  generally  arising 
from  no  just  cause,  that  the  cards,  so  to  speak,  were  stacked 
against  the  applicant  who  possessed  no  "friend"  or  "backing.'' 

Hence  in  the  formulation  of  federal  personnel  practice  it 
is  not  enough  that  the  methods  laid  down  should  insure  fair- 
ness and  impersonal  judgment  as  between  individuals.  It 
is  almost  equally  essential  that  all  operations  be  conducted  in 
the  light  of  the  fullest  and  freest  publicity,  so  that  all  per- 
sons, whether  applicants,  employees,  or  merely  interested  mem- 
bers of  the  public  may  at  all  times  satisfy  themselves  that  the 
regulations  and  procedures  laid  down  are  being  observed  in 
fact.  This  fairly  obvious  requirement  is  here  stressed  with 
what  may  seem  unnecessary  length.  The  reason  is  that  it  has 
been,  of  all  the  non-technical  requirements  of  a  sound  federal 
personnel  system,  the  most  sadly  neglected  up  to  the  present 
time. 

S  The  last  and  perhaps  most  fundamental  difference  between 
the  federal  service  and  private  enterprise  that  requires  special 
comment  is  that  in  private  enterprise  the  higher  oflficers  are 
generally  selected  solely  because  of  their  capacity  for  their 
work  and  hence  can  safely  be  entrusted  with  a  large  meas- 
ure of  authority  in  selecting  and  promoting  their  subordinate 
employees;  whereas  in  the  federal  service  thev  are  often  se- 
lected because  of  their  past  work  for  their  political  party,  and 
if  entrusted  with  authority  in  selecting  and  promoting  the 
employees  under  their  jurisdiction  they  will  be  guided  more 
by  the  interests  of  the  party  than  by  the  needs  of  the  under- 
taking. I  So  long  as  this  method  of  selecting  upper  officers  on 
political  grounds  is  permitted  to  continue,  the  methods  of 
personnel  administration  in  the  government  service  must  dif- 
fer radically  from  the  methods  used  in  private  enterprise^ 

The  complete  revision  of  the  compensation  standards  now 
prevailing  for  the  important  executive  positions  in  the  fed- 


INTRODUCTION  i73 

eral  service  and  their  more  or  less  close  assimilation  to  the 
standards  prevailing  for  similar  positions  in  private  industry 
is  an  indispensable  prerequisite  to  the  improvement  of  the 
caliber  of  the  executive  personnel.  But  this  alone  will  by  no 
means  be  sufficient.  Only  if  all  the  conditions  of  employment 
are  correct,  and  particularly  the  conditions  respecting  security 
of  tenure  and  congeniality  of  work,  will  the  proper  material 
for  important  executive  positions  be  recruited  and  retained. 
To  men  and  women  of  this  type  a  large  freedom  of  action, 
with  a  commensurate  responsibility  for  results,  is  the  chief  ele- 
ment of  attractiveness  in  their  employment.  As  has  been 
pointed  out  already,  the  basis  upon  which  the  entire  federal 
administrative  structure  has  been  more  or  less  consistently 
reared — that  of  detailed  prescription  by  Congress,  months  in 
advance,  of  innumerable  minutiae  of  administrative  detail,  and 
the  centralization  of  responsibility  for  all  final  decisions  at 
the  highest  practicable  point  in  the  administrative  hierarchy 
— has  a  diametrically  opposite  tendency.  Not  until  a  thor- 
oughgoing reform  has  been  eflfected  on  both  these  heads  will 
the  executive  administrative  positions  in  the  federal  service 

compete  with  those  in  \nc\u<^ftyjp  p^ttrartiy^^pcc  fr^  pp.rqr.tic;  r^f 


the  executive  type. 

The  Airrrand'^cope  of  Personnel  Administration. — The 


aim  of  personnel  administration  may  be  defined  as  the  recruit- 
ment of  capable  workers  and  their  retention  under  conditions 
which  will  develop  their  maximum  usefulness.  From  this 
obvious  definition  flows  equally  obviously  the  necessity,  on 
the  one  hand,  for  establishing  such  conditions  of  employment 
as  will  attract  to  and  retain  in  the  service  the  class  of  personnel 
desired,  and  will  maintain  their  zeal  and  good  will;  and  on 
the  other,  for  the  use  by  the  directing  personnel  of  such  meth- 
ods in  recruitment,  assignment,  transfer,  promotion,  and  re- 
moval of  the  employees  under  their  direction  as  will  insure 
that  each  individual  is  placed  to  the  best  advantage.  Of  these 
two  phases,  the  first,  relating  to  conditions  of  employment, 
may  be  termed  the  substantive  and  the  second,  relating  to  meth- 
ods of  administration,  the  adjective.    The  first  is  fundamental. 


174  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE- 

Unless  the  basic  conditions  of  employment  involving  compen- 
sation, working  time,  opportunity  for  congenial  work  and 
advancement,  security  of  tenure,  protection  against  arbitrary 
action  by  superiors,  and  other  like  elements,  are  sound,  no 
refinement  of  technique  on  the  part  of  the  personnel  admin- 
istrator can  save  the  personnel  system  from  mediocrity,  if  not 
from  substantial  failure. 

The  methods  of  personnel  administration,  moreover,  are 
themselves  a  part  of  the  conditions  of  employment.  Com- 
pensation and  working  time  standards,  methods  of  selecting 
for  reassignment  and  promotion  are  of  little  value  unless 
skillfully  applied  and  administered;  and  security  of  tenure  and 
safeguards  against  arbitrary  action,  designed  for  the  benefit 
of  the  efficient  and  loyal  employee,  in  feeble  or  unskilled  hands, 
may  become  a  shield  for  the  shirker  and  malingerer,  resulting 
in  a  clogging  of  the  service  with  deadwood  and  a  basic  impair- 
ment of  its  attractiveness  to  the  desirable  type  of  employee. 

Hence  it  is  impracticable  in  examining  the  problem  of  per- 
sonnel administration,  particularly  as  it  presents  itself  in  so 
large  a  system  as  the  federal  service,  to  consider  separately 
the  questions  of  employment  conditions  and  of  personnel  meth- 
ods. With  respect  to  each  part  of  the  personnel  problem  they 
must  be  considered  concurrently. 

Procedure  in  Developing  a  Proper  Personnel  System. — 
In  seeking  to  arrange  the  several  parts  of  the  personnel  prob- 
lem for  orderly  presentation,  it  is  difficult,  if  not  impossible, 
to  discover  a  sequence  in  which  each  part  is  based  wholly  on 
what  precedes  and  is,  in  turn,  fundamental  to  what  follows. 
The  various  phases  of  a  personnel  system  react  upon  each 
other.  It  seems  best,  therefore,  to  approach  them  in  the  order 
in  which  one  would  proceed  were  one  planning,  in  advance  of 
any  actual  execution,  a  theoretically  complete  personnel  system 
and  formulating  all  the  principles  and  practices  which  should 
govern  its  operation. 

Needless  to  say,  a  personnel  system  is  seldom  if  ever  ac- 
tually thus  developed.  In  most  large  organizations  the  sys- 
tem of  personnel,  like  other  phases  of  administration,  is  shaped 


INTRODUCTION  i75 

by  current  determinations,  made  in  response  to  what  seem  to 
be  current  needs;  and  when  a  particular  defect  appears  a  rem- 
edy is  appHed  that  may  or  may  not  be  sufficiently  general  in 
scope  adequately  to  correct  the  difficulty.  Such  has  been  pre- 
eminently the  history  of  the  federal  system.  On  that  account, 
doubtless,  it  will  be  all  the  more  useful  to  approach  the  cur- 
rent system  from  the  theoretical  point  of  view,  and  thus  to 
develop  most  clearly  the  manner  and  the  extent  of  its  diver- 
gence for  the  theoretical  ideal. 

The  first  step  in  the  construction  of  a  well  ordered  per- 
sonnel system  is  the  systematic  classification  of  the  personnel 
required  and  the  determination  of  the  compensation  to  be  at- 
tached to  each  class.  The  next  step  is  to  determine  which  of 
the  positions  listed  is  normally  to  be  filled  by  recruitment  from 
outside  the  service,  and  which  by  selection  from  within  the 
service,  whether  by  promotion  or  transfer.  This  question  of 
selection  from  within  as  opposed  to  recruitment  from  without 
is  perhaps  the  most  basic  of  all  the  general  questions  which 
the  construction  of  a  personnel  system  presents.  Upon  its 
solution  will  depend  in  greater  or  less  degree  the  decision 
taken  on  each  of  the  other  major  questions  presented.  Once 
settled,  the  methods  and  practices  to  be  followed  in  applying 
each  of  these  two  methods  of  selection  must  be  determined. 
After  positions  are  assumed  to  be  filled,  the  next  question  is 
what  practices  shall  be  adopted  to  stimulate  the  individual 
worker  to  zeal  and  productivity;  and  the  cognate  question  of 
the  measures  to  be  taken  to  check  positive  inefficiency  or  mis- 
conduct. Next  is  the  question,  related  to  the  last,  but  quite, 
distinct  from  it,  of  the  system  to  be  provided  to  relieve  the 
service  of  those  disabled  through  age  or  accident.  Finally, 
the  question  is  presented  of  the  measures  which  may  be  taken 
to  elevate  the  general  level  of  interest,  health,  contentment, 
and  technical  efficiency.  These  constitute  the  primary,  positive  i  y 
problems  of  personnel  administration,  each  more  or  less  dis- 
tinct yet  each  intimately  bound  up  with  the  others. 

Of  no  less  importance  than  the  development  of  the  prin- 
ciples to  be  applied  to  each  of  the  problems  thus  defined  is  the 


176  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

determination  of  who  shall  be  charged  with  their  formulation 
and  application.  To  what  extent  should  Congress  itself  at- 
tempt to  do  this,  and  to  what  extent  should  it  be  left  to  the 
President,  to  a  central  personnel  agency,  or  to  the  depart- 
ments? And,  in  the  case  of  each  authority,  to  what  extent 
should  the  body  of  the  personnel  itself,  whether  acting  through 
officially  constituted  organs,  or  through  organizations  stand- 
ing outside  of  the  official  structure,  be  consulted  with  or  given 
a  share  in  the  determination? 

The  Problem  of  Personnel  Control. — The  need  for  the 
establishment  of  means  of  controlling  administrative  officers 
in  respect  to  the  appointment,  promotion,  or  dismissal  of  em- 
ployees with  a  view  to  eliminating  political  and  personnel 
administrators  has  been  pointed  out.  The  aggregate  of  such 
restrictions  frequently  goes  by  the  name  of  civil  service  con- 
trol. Since  such  civil  service  control  is  negative  and  restric- 
tive, it  obviously  should  be  limited  to  what  is  strictly  neces- 
sary. What  those  limits  are  will  depend  upon  factors  which 
differ  from  service  to  service  and  from  time  to  time,  such  as 
the  state  of  political  morality,  the  character  of  the  chief  ad- 
ministrators and  the  method  of  their  selection,  and  the  im- 
portance of  the  work  to  be  accomplished  by  the  subordinate 
personnel.  The  degree  of  civil  service  control  necessary  at 
any  particular  point  in  the  personnel  system  is  thus  variable. 
Unfortunately,  civil  service  control,  necessarily  based  upon 
laws,  rules,  and  regulations,  tends  to  become  static  and  fixed, 
so  that  it  is  exercised  for  a  considerable  time  after  the  con- 
ditions which  called  it  forth  have  changed  or  disappeared.  So 
long  as  its  extent  is  substantially  proportionate  to  the  dangers 
of  political  and  personal  favoritism  to  be  overcome,  it  ad- 
vances correct  personnel  administration ;  but  once  restrictive 
control  goes  beyond  this  point,  it  becomes  a  hindrance. 

The  delimitation  and  the  current  readjustment  of  the 
proper  boundaries  of  civil  service  control  thus  present  one  of 
the  most  difficult  problems  of  public  personnel  administration ; 
and  it  can  be  solved  only  by  a  careful  and  continuing  study 
of  the  actual  conditions  of  political  life  which  the  civil  service 


INTRODUCTION  i77 

control  is  designed  to  meet.  In  the  present  study  of  the  fed- 
eral personnel  system  no  attempt  is  made  to  define  a  priori  the 
precise  degree  of  such  control  which  should  be  imposed.  The 
effort  is  rather  to  study,  in  connection  with  each  point  of  per- 
sonnel procedure  at  which  political  favoritism  may  enter,  the 
past,  present,  and  probable  future  conditions  of  political  pres- 
sure at  that  point,  and  to  make  recommendations  for  civil 
service  control  accordingly. 

The  Need  for  Special  Organization  for  Personnel  Ad- 
ministration.— A  final  characteristic  of  the  problem  of 
personnel  administration,  often  lost  sight  of  in  public  em- 
ployment, though  gaining  increasing  recognition  in  private 
enterprise,  is  that  it  calls  for  specialized  attention  on  the  part 
of  officers  specifically  designated  for  the  work.  Necessarily, 
of  course,  the  final  decision  in  matters  of  personnel  must  rest 
largely  with  the  administrator  responsible  for  results.  He 
cannot  be  held  responsible  if  he  is  compelled  to  employ  peo- 
ple whom  he  deems  unsuitable,  or  if  he  is  unduly  restrained 
from  exercising  his  own  discretion  in  promoting,  removing, 
disciplining,  and  otherwise  controlling  the  employees  under 
his  direction.  In  personnel  administration,  however,  much 
more  than  this  is  needed.  The  administrative  officer  is  prone 
to  regard  the  employees  under  his  jurisdiction  merely  as  in- 
strumentalities for  producing  results.  He  does  not  have  tinie 
or  frequently,  natural  bent,  to  view  them  as  potential  re- 
sources of  the  service,  whose  development  for  higher  useful- 
ness in  the  service  is  always  to  be  kept  in  mind  equally  with 
their  present  utility.  Nor  is  he  likely  to  give  sufficient  con- 
sideration to  the  purely  personal  and  human  aspects  of  the 
matter,  the  desire  of  the  employee  for  advancement,  and  his 
dissatisfaction  with  his  employment  conditions.  Hence, 
he  is  as  likely  as  not  to  overlook  opportunities  for  devel- 
oping latent  material  and  for  adding  to  the  contentment  and 
happiness,  and  hence  to  the  morale  of  the  service.  Nor  in 
the  formulation  of  personnel  policies  does  he  always  consider 
long-time  values  for  the  service  as  a  whole,  as  against  im- 
mediate results. 


1782^  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 


The  employment  manager  or  personnel  manager,  now  so 
commonly  found  in  private  enterprise,  has  come  into  being, 
to  give  special  consideration  to  personnel  matters,  in  respect 
both  to  general  policies  and  to  actions  affecting  individuals. 
The  specific  functions  entrusted  to  the  employment  depart- 
ment of  a  large  private  enterprise,  and  its  organization  within 
the  several  operating  divisions  of  the  enterprise,  are  matters 
which  vary  widely  from  one  concern  to  another.  But  the  gen- 
eral theory  on  which  the  expenditure  for  the  services  of  the 
employment  manager  and  his  assistants  is  justified  is  the  same 
— that  it  furnishes  the  necessary  additional  assurance  that  in 
the  desire  for  immediate  results  in  production,  the  interests  of 
the  enterprise  in  a  well  trained,  advantageously  assigned  per- 
sonnel shall  not  be  neglected. 

In  the  federal  service,  as  will  appear  in  the  discussion  of 
the  specific  aspects  of  personnel  administration  contained  in 
the  following  chapters,  the  need  for  the  employment,  or  per- 
sonnel manager,  as  herein  conceived,  as  yet  has  received  vir- 
tually no  recognition.  Some  officers  have  titles  which  appar- 
ently imply  that  their  function  is  that  of  an  employment  man- 
ager, but  on  examination  it  is  usually  found  that  their  duties 
are  confined  to  the  maintenance  of  personnel  records  and  to 
insistence  on  the  observance  of  the  rules  and  regulations  re- 
garding their  performance. 

Changes  in  practice  and  procedure  are  suggested  at  not  a 
few  points  in  the  following  pages.  In  hardly  any  cases  can 
the  advantages  of  the  method  proposed  be  realized  merely  by 
an  amendment  to  the  formal  rules  and  regulations.  They  are 
the  fruit  only  of  consistent  and  zealous  effort  by  an  officer 
studious  to  improve  the  employment  system.  Unless  the 
function  of  employment  management  is  substantially  developed 
in  the  federal  service  many  otherwise  curable  defects  will 
remain.  On  the  other  hand,  should  that  development  take 
place,  a  substantial  improvement  will  unquestionably  result, 
not  merely  in  those  respects  to  which  attention  is  called  in  the 
succeeding  chapters  but  over  the  whole  field  of  personnel 
administration. 


INTRODUCTION  (^  17^ 

Although  in  private  practice  the  function  of  employment 
management  is  usually  entrusted  to  a  single  individual  who 
makes  it  his  sole  concern,  it  is  by  no  means  indispensable  that 
such  should  be  the  case.  In  the  federal  service,  doubtless, 
much  can  be  accomplished  merely  by  developing  special  com- 
mittees and  bodies  of  administrative  officers,  either  for  formu- 
lating policies  respecting  personnel  or  for  taking  action  in 
matters  affecting  particular  individuals.  The  essential  point 
is  to  make  the  function  of  personnel  management  distinct  from 
operating  administration  and  to  develop  a  separate  organiza- 
tion for  the  performance  of  that  function,  whether  by  utiliz- 
ing existing  officers  or  by  engaging  special  officers  for  this 
particular  purpose. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  CLASSIFICATION  AND   STANDARDIZATION   OF 
POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES 

The  fundamental  basis  of  an  efficient  public  personnel  sys- 
tem is  a  logical  and  systematic  classification  and  standardiza- 
tion of  all  positions  comprehended  by  such  a  system  and  of 
the  compensations  attaching  to  the  several  positions  therein 
set  forth.  By  this  is  meant  that  there  must  be  established  by 
statute  or  administrative  action  a  formal  enumeration  of  all 
positions  required  in  order  that  the  activities  of  the  govern- 
ment to  which  it  relates  may  be  properly  performed,  with  a 
description  of  the  duties  and  responsibilities  of  each  position, 
the  qualifications  recjuired  of  its  incumbent  and  the  compen- 
sation attaching  to  it;  that  these  several  positions  shall  be 
classified  in  groups  and  sub-groups  according  to  their  charac- 
ter and  within  which  they  must  be  graded  according  to  the 
relative  degrees  of  experience,  skill,  and  responsibilities  re- 
quired of  their  holders;  and,  finally,  that  provision  be  made 
for  the  current  revision  of  this  classification  as  need  therefor 
arises.  Not  until  this  is  done,  and  done  properly,  is  it  pos- 
sible to  handle  in  a  satisfactory  manner  any  of  the  major 
problems  of  personnel  administration,  recruitment,  promotion, 
allocation  of  duties,  determination  of  personnel  needs,  etc. 

In  a  small  undertaking  the  determination  of  the  qualifica- 
tions, duties,  and  compensation  is  commonly  and  satisfactorily 
made  whenever  occasion  arises  for  filling  a  vacancy,  making 
a  promotion,  or  increasing  a  salary.  In  these  cases  the  de- 
termining factor  is  the  value  attached  to  the  services  of  the 
individual  involved.  As  the  organization  expands,  this  method 
usually  persists.  It  soon  becomes  apparent,  however,  that, 
despite  the  seeming  common  sense  of  this  method,  it  results 

180 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  i8i 

in  wide  variations  in  compensationf  or  the  same  work  and  m 
undue  discrepancies  between  the  pay  for  different  kinds  of 
"work!  It  is  then  foundlhat,  if  these  inequahties  are  to  be 
avoided,  the  compensation  rates  to  be  attached  to  each  posi- 
tion must  be  determined  on  the  basis  of  duties  of  positions 
without  regard  to  the  individuals  occupying  them.  A  Hm- 
ited  variation  in  the  precise  pay  for  a  position  may  be  made, 
of  course,  to  provide  for  clearly  defined  variations  in  efficiency 
and  length  of  service,  but  the  rates  established  and  the  re- 
quirements in  respect  to  efficiency  and  length  of  service  must 
be  made  without  regard  to  any  particular  individual.  As  the 
organization  becomes  larger  and  its  activities  more  varied  it 
becomes  increasingly  necessary  to  fix  compensation  on  the 
basis  of  duties  and  to  determine  and  classify  positions  on  this 
basis,  if  anything  like  substantial  justice  is  to  be  done  between 
individual  employees  and  compensation  rates  are  to  conform 
to  the  character  of  work  and  responsibilities  involved.  Finally 
the  time  arrives  when,  if  an  efficient  personnel  system  is  to 
exist,  it  is  imperative  that  a  systematic  classification  and  stand- 
ardization of  all  positions  and  salaries,  as  above  set  forth, 
shall  be  made.  Especially  is  this  so  in  a  government  where 
all  personnel  provisions,  in  the  final  instance,  must  be  deter- 
mined by  or  have  the  approval  of  a  legislative  body. 

In  the  case  of  no  undertaking  or  government  in  the  world 
is  the  need  for  such  a  standardized  classification  of  positions 
and  compensation  greater  than  in  that  of  the  national  govern- 
ment of  the  United  States,  This  results  from  the  magnitude 
of  its  operations  and  the  variety  of  its  activities.  It  is  thus  a 
matter  of  great  moment  to  determine  the  extent  to  which  this 
fundamental  requirement  of  an  efficient  personnel  system  has 
been  met. 

Legislative  Determination  of  Positions  and  Salaries:  The 
Statutory  Roll. — It  needs  but  a  minute's  inspection  of 
the  personnel  system  now  in  existence  to  reveal  that  hardly  a 
beginning  has  been  made  in  this  direction.  To  begin  with 
the  first  requisite  to  the  establishment  of  such  a  system  is  that 
uniformity  shall  exist  in  respect  to  the  determination  of  the 


i82  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

positions  that  shall  be  provided  for  and  the  compensation  that 
shall  attach  to  such  positions.  This  uniformity  is  wholly 
lacking  in  the  federal  system.  In  some  cases  Congress  itself 
attempts  directly  to  determine  the  number,  character,  and  com- 
pensation of  positions.  In  others  it  leaves  this  to  adminis- 
trative authorities,  subject  to  varying  limitations. 

The  positions  for  which  Congress  establishes  by  statute 
the  precise  number  at  each  title  and  compensation,  although 
constituting  but  a  small  fraction  of  the  federal  service,  are 
very  numerous,  embracing  most  of  the  important  positions, 
and  a  host  of  minor  ones.  The  positions  of  the  heads  and 
assistant  heads  of  departments,  services,  and  bureaus,  local 
chief  officers  and  a  few  other  important  positions,  are  gener- 
ally established  ^  in  the  first  instance  by  permanent  acts,  us- 
ually the  organic  acts  relating  to  the  service  in  which  they  fall. 
The  salary  rates  fixed  in  such  acts,  however,  are  annually 
confirmed  and  occasionally  altered  by  the  annual  appropriation 
acts  in  which  provision  is  made  for  the  payment  of  those 
salaries. 

Minor  positions  which  Congress  establishes  by  statute  may 
be  created  in  the  organic  acts  or  they  may  be  provided  for  only 
in  the  annual  appropriation  acts.  Legally  considered,  posi- 
tions established  by  appropriation  acts  only  have  no  perma- 
nent existence  but  are  confirmed  from  year  to  year. 

The  following,  taken  from  the  act  making  appropriations 
for  the  sundry  civil  expenses  of  the  government  for  the  fiscal 
year  1919,  illustrates  the  method  of  statutory  establishment  of 
positions  by  appropriation  acts : 

Employees'  Compensation  Commission :  Salaries  :    Three 
commissioners  at  $4,000  each;  secretary  and  solicitor,  $3,000; 

^  In  the  case  of  some  of  the  local  chief  officers  the  statutes  create  a 
distinct  position  for  each  local  establishment.  Thus,  there  is  not  a  general 
class  of  positions  of  "collectors  of  customs"  established  by  Congress,  but 
the  position  of  Collector  of  Customs  at  tlic  Port  of  New  York,  Collector 
of  Customs  at  the  Port  of  Boston,  etc.  In  other  cases,  the  statute  merely 
creates  a  numlier  of  identical  positions  (the  number  being  cither  fixed 
or  to  be  varied  l)y  the  President  within  limits)  without  designating  the 
localities  to  which  such  positions  must  be  assigned.  Such  is  the  case  with 
collectors  of  internal  revenue.  (See  Revised  Statutes,  Sees.  3141,  3142, 
and  act  of  August  15,  1876,  19  Stat.  152.) 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  183 

chief  statistician,  $3,500;  disbursing  agent,  $2,000;  claim  ex- 
aminers— chief,  $2,250,  assistant,  $1,800,  two  assistants  at 
$1,600  each;  special  agents — one,  $1,800,  two  at  $1,600  each; 
clerks — four  of  class  three,  eight  of  class  two,  eight  of  class 
one,  two  at  $1,000  each;  messenger,  $840;  telephone  oper- 
ator, $720;  in  all,  $63,510. 

In  the  higher  levels  of  the  service,  as  already  indicated, 
almost  all  positions  are  statutory.  With  respect  to  positions 
below  these  levels,  however,  it  is  impossible  to  define  with 
precision  the  principle  which  Congress,  in  framing  appropria- 
tion acts,  employs  in  selecting  the  positions  to  be  placed  on  a 
statutory  basis.  Wide  variations  in  practice  are  found,  im- 
possible to  explain  on  any  consistent  basis. 

In  general  it  may  be  said,  though  there  are  exceptions  even 
here,  that  it  is  the  practice  for  Congress  to  establish  by  law 
all  the  positions,  however  minor,  attached  to  the  office  of  the 
head  of  a  department  or  bureau.  In  the  operating  divisions 
of  the  several  bureaus  and  services,  including  the  whole  of  their 
field  organizations,  specific  positions,  other  than  heads  and 
deputy  heads  of  local  offices,  are  seldom  established  by  statute. 
In  a  few  of  the  field  services,  however,  the  specification  of 
"statutory"  positions  for  each  field  station  or  office  in  the 
same  detail  as  that  employed  for  the  central  offices  at  Wash- 
ington is  followed. 

No  computation  of  the  precise  number  of  positions  spe- 
cifically established  by  Congress  is  available;  probably  20,000 
would  not  be  over  the  mark.  The  Reclassification  Commis- 
sion found  that  in  the  Book  of  Estimates  for  1920  the  posi- 
tions in  the  Washington  service  established  by  statute  carry 
583  different  titles.  These  positions  are  found  in  every 
branch  of  the  service.  Manifestly,  Congress,  in  establishing 
these  positions,  if  it  is  to  do  its  work  properly,  should  be 
guided  by  a  standard  schedule  of  classes  in  which  the  duties 
of  each  class  are  defined,  and  an  appropriate  title  and  com- 
pensation rate  attached  to  each.  Manifestly,  too,  it  should 
have  at  hand  accurate  information  as  to  the  duties  performed 
in  each  position.     It  is  perhaps  needless  to  say  that  Congress 


i84  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

has  never  taken  measures  to  meet  either  of  these  two  require- 
ments. It  has  enacted  no  schedule  of  classes  and  grades  of 
service.^  It  has  not  even  attempted  a  definition  of  the  duties 
of  the  specific  positions,  much  less  a  comparative  grading  of 
those  positions  within  each  class,  as  a  basis  for  the  fixation 
of  rates.  The  only  standard  by  which  the  correctness  or  ade- 
quacy of  the  rates  fixed  for  the  thousands  of  statutory  posi- 
tions has  been  measured  in  recent  years  has  been  the  personal 
judgment  of  the  members  of  the  committees  of  Congress  re- 
sponsible for  appropriation  measures.  Nor  have  the  congres- 
sional committees  commonly  had  before  them,  in  passing  upon 
the  titles  and  compensation  rates  for  these  "statutory"  posi- 
tions, more  than  the  most  meager  information  as  to  the  duties 
involved.  For  the  most  part  the  schedules  of  statutory  posi- 
tions have  been  reenacted  from  year  to  year  virtually  without 
examination  of  the  duties  being  performed  or  to  be  performed 

^  In  certain  of  the  groups  of  statutory  positions  will  be  found  a  series 
of  titles  and  compensation  rates,  which  at  first  blush  seem  to  approximate 
a  true  classification,  even  though  lacking  in  express  definitions  of  duties. 
Upon  close  examination,  however,  they  will  be  found  to  have  no  definite 
relation  to  the  duties  of  particular  positions.  A  good  illustration  is  found 
in  titles  and  compensation  rates  provided  for  the  examining  force  of  the 
Patent  Office.  The  examining  corps  proper  is  organized  in  a  number  of 
divisions,  at  the  head  of  each  of  which  is  a  principal  examiner.  Under 
each  principal  examiner  are  a  greater  or  less  number  of  assistant  exam- 
iners. These  assistant  examiners  fall  into  four  grades,  with  correspond- 
ing salary  rates.  The  several  grades,  however,  do  not  correspond  to  well 
defined  gradations  in  the  difficulty  and  responsibility  of  the  duties  or  work 
performed.  An  assistant  examiner  may  pass  from  one  grade  to  the  next, 
as  a  vacancy  occurs,  without  his  duties  changing  in  any  respect ;  and  the 
difficulty  and  responsibility  of  his  duties  may  greatly  increase  without  his 
receiving  any  advancement  in  grade.  A  similar  grading  is  found  in  the 
Public  Health  Service.  In  both  cases  there  is,  of  course,  a  natural  prob- 
ability that  long  service  necessary  for  advancement  in  rank,  will  entail 
advancement  in  difficulty  and  responsibility  of  duties ;  but  this  is  not  of 
the  essence  of  the  classification,  which  will  be  applied  even  in  cases  where 
the  actual  result  has  been  a  much  less  or  much  greater  growth  in  difficulty 
or  responsibility  of  duty  than  is  usual.  In  a  numl^cr  of  places  in  the  ap- 
propriation acts  containing  statutnry  positions  and  rates,  there  will  be 
found  the  title  "Clerk,  Class  i,"  "Clerk,  Class  2,"  etc.  To  the  uninitiated 
these  designations  might  seem  to  refer  to  a  standard  classification  of 
duties  elsewhere  prescribed,  .'^uch  is  not  the  case,  however.  The  reference 
is  merely  to  the  so-called  "classification"  of  clerks,  enacted  by  Congress  in 
1853,  by  which  all  clerical  positions  fnr  which  no  specific  salary  was  fixed 
by  "statute  were  to  be  paid  either  $1,800,  $1,600,  $1,400  or  $1,200  and  were 
to  be  designated  as  of  Class  i,  2,  3  or  4,  accordingly.  A  "clerk  of  class  i" 
is,  therefore,  merely  another  way  of  saying  a  "clerk  at  $t,8oo."  Congress 
has  never  attempted  to  define,  even  in  the  most  general  terms,  the  grades 
of  duty  appropriate  to  each  of  these  classes. 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  185 

under  the  several  titles,  change  being  made  usually  only  when 
an  increase  of  salary  for  some  employee  on  the  statutory  roll 
is  urged  upon  the  committee,  or  when  an  administrative  offi- 
cer succeeds  in  convincing  the  Committees  that  a  different  ar- 
rangement of  statutory  positions  is  in  the  interest  of  the  gov- 
ernment. 

The  consukr  .service  ^furnishes  perhaps  the  only  instance 
except  in  the  postal  service  in  which  Congress  has  attempted 
and  ordered  classification  of  the  duties  of  the  service  and  the 
corresponding  fixation  of  con>pensation  rates  for  particular 
positions.  The  salaries  of  consuls  are  fixed  not  in  the  annual 
appropriation  act  but  in  a  general  setting  up  of  eight  consular 
grades  with  corresponding  salary  rates,  and  allocating  each 
consulate  and  each  consulate  general  to  a  specific  grade,  pre- 
sumably with  reference  to  the  difficulty  and  responsibility  of 
the  work  attached  to  the  several  posts. 

While  the  principle  of  this  schedule  of  grading  is  entirely 
sound,  it  is  believed  that  the  determination  of  the  relative  dif- 
ficulty and  importance  of  the  several  consulates  is  one  that 
should  be  made  not  by  Congress  but  by  the  State  Department. 
Here  as  elsewhere  the  crystallization  of  a  classification  or  grad- 
ing made  at  a  given  time  into  a  statute  almost  inevitably  tends 
to  make  permanent  or  static  the  classification  thus  enacted 
despite  the  changes  which  may  subsequently  ensue.  The  pres- 
ent grading  of  consulates  was  enacted  in  1906.  It  needs  no 
argument  that  the  relative  importance  of  the  several  consulates. 
has  greatly  shifted  since  that  time,  yet  the  grading  remains 
the  same. 

Administrative  Determination  of  Positions  and  Salaries: 
Lump  Sum  Appropriations. — All  positions  and  salaries  not 
set  up  by  act  of  Congress  are  established  either  by  the  Presi- 
dent or  by  the  heads  of  departments.  In  a  few  cases  Congress 
has  specifically  authorized  the  establishment  of  positions  of  a 
particular  class  in  the  discretion  of  the  President.  Aside  from 
such  exceptional  cases,  however,  the  power  to  establish  posi- 
tions and  salary  rates,  when  not  exercised  by  Congress,  is 
vested  in  the  heads  of  departments  and  independent  establish- 


i86  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

merits,  partly  under  certain  express  provisions  of  law,  some 
of  which  are  more  or  less  obsolete  and  inapplicable,  and  partly 
under  the  implied  power  which  an  appropriation  act  confers 
upon  these  heads  to  take  all  steps  necessary  in  the  expenditure 
of  the  appropriations  with  which  Congress  has  entrusted  them. 

If  Congress,  in  making  an  appropriation  for  a  specific  pur- 
pose involving  the  employment  of  personnel,  does  not  specify 
the  positions  and  salary  rates  at  which  such  personnel  shall 
be  employed,  the  appropriation  is  commonly  designated  as  a 
"lump-sum"  appropriation.^ 

As  an  example  of  such  a  lump-sum  appropriation  may  be 
cited  the  following: 

To  further  enable  the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission 
to  enforce  compliance  with  section  twenty  of  the  Act  to  regu- 
late commerce  as  amended  by  the  Act  approved  June  twenty- 
ninth,  nineteen  hundred  and  six,  including  the  employment  of 
necessary  special  agents  or  examiners,  $300,000.^ 

In  the  postal  service  Congress  has  adopted  a  practice  in 
the  establishment  of  positions  different  from  that  followed  by 
it  in  any  other  service.  It  would  be  manifestly  impossible, 
of  course,  for  Congress  to  establish  by  statute  the  precise 
positions  to  be  set  up  at  each  and  every  Post  Office.  On  the 
other  hand.  Congress  does  not  give  to  the  Postmaster  General 
an  absolutely  free  hand  in  this  regard  even  within  the  limits 
of  his  appropriation.  Instead  it  has  adopted  the  peculiar 
method  of  specifying  the  total  number  of  employees  of  what- 
ever designation  to  be  employed  at  a  given  salary  rate.  Thus 
it  provides  for  the  total  number  of  clerks,  carriers,  and  rail- 
way mail  clerks  at  a  certain  rate  to  be  employed  throughout 
the  service;  the  total  number  of  foremen,  money-order  cash- 
iers, assistant  cashiers,  bookkeepers,  examiners,  and  so  on  to 
be  employed  at  a  given  rate.  The  compensation  rates  pre- 
vailing in  the  postal  service,  moreover,  are  based  upon  an  or- 

^  The  term  "lump  sum"  is  also  applied  to  certain  appropriations  which 
cannot  be  expended  for  personal  services,  but  with  these  the  present  work 
is  not  concerned. 

'40  Stat.,  649. 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  187 

dered  classification  of  the  duties  performed  and  a  standard 
schedule  of  compensation  rates  attached  to  the  several  classes 
of  duties.  Without  going  into  all  the  details  of  this  classi- 
fication, which  are  not  of  general  interest  it  may  be  said  that 
among  the  lower  grades  of  employees  the  definite  classes  of 
clerks  in  first  and  second  class  post  offices,  railway  mail  clerks, 
carriers  in  the  city  delivery  service,  rural  delivery  carriers, 
motor  route  carriers,  and  village  delivery  carriers  are  recog- 
nized. In  each  of  these  classes  a  series  of  definite  rates  of 
pay  are  provided  and  employees  advanced  from  rate  to  rate 
after  a  given  length  of  service,  subject  to  certain  standards 
of  efficiency  discussed  in  a  subsequent  chapter.  The  com- 
pensation of  postmasters  of  all  classes  is  graded  according  to 
the  receipts  of  their  offices.  Again,  in  the  first  class  offices, 
where  supervisory  officials  are  required  in  addition  to  the 
Postmaster,  definite  schedules  are  set  up  for  each  grade  of 
post  office  within  the  first  class,  the  grading  being  according 
to  receipts,  and  no  less  than  twenty  different  grades  being 
recognized.  Moreover,  a  separate  grading  is  provided  for  the 
superintending  of  the  stations  within  large  first  class  post  of- 
fices. This  grading  is  according  to  the  number  of  employees 
in  the  station,  ten  grades  being  recognized  for  this  purpose. 
Similar  gradings  are  provided  for  the  divisional  railway  mail 
offices,  the  inspection  services,  etc.^ 

Whatever  the  correctness  of  the  details  of  this  scheme  or 
the  adequacy  of  its  compensation  rates,  it  is  at  least  a  consis- 
tent, ordered  system  for  the  fixation  of  compensation  that 
stands  out  in  marked  contrast  against  the  haphazard  system  in 
the  rest  of  the  federal  service.  The  acts,  indeed,  do  not  define 
the  duties  to  be  performed  under  the  several  titles,  but  these 
duties  doubtless  are  defined  sufficiently  by  the  departmental 
regulations  and  tradition. 

The  method  applied  in  the  postal  service  is  applicable  mani- 
festly only  to  a  very  large  organization ;  and  has  not  been  em- 

*The  scheme  of  classification  and  grading  here  outlined  is  that  estab- 
lished by  the  reclassification  act  of  June  5,  1920.  The  classifications  estab- 
lished by  earlier  acts  which  that  act  superseded  followed  substantially  the 
same  principles  but  were  less  consistent  and  harmonious. 


i88  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

ployed  in  fact  for  any  other  organization.  In  the  remainder 
of  the  service,  where  Congress  has  not  left  the  entire  matter 
wholly  in  the  hands  of  the  administrative  officers,  or  has  not 
itself  fixed  all  the  details,  it  has  commonly  established  the 
maximum  salary  that  may  be  paid  for  a  given  class  of  work; 
sometimes  specifying  also  the  maximum  number  who  might 
be  employed  at  such  niaxinuim  salary,  or  at  salaries  over  a 
specified  amount.  The  total  number  of  positions  whose  com- 
pensation rates  are  governed  by  restrictions  of  this  type  is  not 
inconsiderable  but  they  form  a  very  small  fraction  of  the 
total.  It  is  only  necessary  to  say  that  in  fixing  its  maximum 
rates  in  these  cases  Congress,  or  its  committees,  have  before 
them  no  more  in  the  way  of  a  standard  schedule  of  classes  and 
grades  of  service  than  they  have  in  establishing  statutory  po- 
sitions. 

Over  a  vast  area  of  the  service,  embracing,  if  the  postal 
service  be  left  aside,  far  the  greater  part  of  the  federal  per- 
sonnel. Congress  has  left  the  power  to  establish  specific  posi- 
tions and  fix  their  compensation  rates  in  the  hands  of  the  ad- 
ministrative officers  largely  without  restriction.  But  here,  as 
elsewhere,  it  has  completely  failed  to  provide  any  standard 
classification  of  classes  and  grades  of  service  to  guide  and  con- 
trol the  action  of  the  administrative  officers  in  the  exercise 
of  the  power  entrusted  to  them.  So  far  as  the  fixation  of  the 
titles  and  compensation  rates  of  positions  established  by  ad- 
ministrative action  have  been  based  upon  sound  principles  of 
classification,  the  result  is  due  wholly  to  the  initiative  and  abil- 
ity of  the  administrative  officers  concerned. 

To  attempt  a  general  characterization  of  the  situation  pre- 
vailing over  the  whole  service  in  this  respect  is  at  best  haz- 
ardous; conditions  vary  greatly  from  department  to  depart- 
ment, and  in  some  departments  equally  from  service  to  service. 
It  may  be  said  safely,  however,  that  over  a  considerable  area 
of  the  service,  the  heads  of  departments  and  bureaus  have  ex- 
ercised their  wide  discretion  in  the  fixation  of  rates  for  indi- 
vidual positions  with  but  little  more  regard  to  correct  prin- 
ciples than  has  Congress.     In  those  services  in  which  a  clear 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  189 

differentiation  into  classes  is  almost  automatic  because  of  the 
nature  of  the  work,  such  a  differentiation,  of  course,  exists, 
and  it  would  be  improved  in  form  rather  than  in  substance  by 
the  formulation  of  a  standard  classification  embodying  explicit 
definitions  of  duty  for  each  grade.  In  these  areas  the  general 
failure  of  administrative  officers  to  draw  up  a  formal  classi- 
fication is  merely  a  technical  delinquency.  The  same  failure 
has  occurred,  however,  with  equal  generality  with  respect  to 
those  services  in  which  a  clear-cut,  complete,  and  formal  clas- 
sification is  indispensable  to  effective  personnel  administration. 
At  best  what'' is  usually  found  in  these  cases  is  merely  a  scheme 
of  titles  with  a  scale  of  compensation  rates  attached  without 
any  clear  definition  being  attempted  of  the  differences  in  the 
duties  to  be  performed  under  the  several  titles.^  At  worst, 
there  will  be  found,  especially  in  respect  to  the  clerical  service, 
a  failure  not  merely  to  adhere  to,  but  even  to  develop  so  much 
as  a  consistent  scheme  of  titles. 

In  the  actual  application  of  rates  based  on  titles  instead 
of  definition  of  duties,  some  more  or  less  clearly  defined  rela- 
tionship between  duties  and  compensation  commonly  guides 
the  executives,  and  becomes  a  matter  of  tradition  or  under- 
standing among  the  personnel  generally.  Experience  proves, 
however,  that  such  a  genial  reliance  on  a  general  understand- 
ing of  loose  distinctions  is  a  snare  and  a  delusion.  Even 
where  a  highly  developed,  formalized  and  published  classi- 
fication exists,  with  the  duties  appropriate  to  each  class  ac- 

*  In  theory  it  is  quite  possible,  though  very  inconvenient,  to  draw  up  a 
sound  scheme  of  compensation  rates  without  employing  titles  at  all ;  but 
it  is  impossible  (though  sometimes  apparently  quite  convenient)  to  draw 
up  such  a  scheme  merely  by  employing  titles  without  employing  definitions 
of  duties.  An  apparent  exception  is  found  where  the  titles  themselves 
accurately  and  fully  describe  the  duties  intended,  an  occurrence  much 
rarer  than  might  be  thought  without  examination.  In  not  a  few  cases 
there  exist  classifications  based  solely  on  titles,  which  superficially  seem 
accurately  to  imply  certain  duties.  On  examination  it  usually  appears  that 
no  such  accurate  definition  is  in  fact  implied  in  them.  "The  facts  abun- 
dantly prove  the  contention  that  the  present  titles,  despite  their  great 
number  and  variety,  are  of  almost  no  value  for  identifying  the  nature  of 
the  worik  actually  performed.  It  is  apparent  that  the  present  appropriation, 
payroll,  and  common  titles  of  positions  cannot  serve  as  a  basis  for  a 
system  of  uniform  and  equitable  pay  for  the  same  character  of  employ- 
ment."   Report  of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  Part  I,  p.  49. 


I90  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

curately  defined,  its  correct  application  to  particular  cases  is 
often  difficult.  Where  no  such  classification  exists,  the  inev- 
itable result  is  wide  variations  in  compensation  rate  between 
individuals  in  the  same  branch  of  the  service  doing  substan- 
tially the  same  work,  and,  conversely,  substantially  the  same 
compensation  rates  for  individuals  in  the  same  branch  of  the 
service  doing  work  of  widely  different  grades  of  difficulty  and 
responsibility,^ 

That  such  a  result  has  actually  ensued  over  large  areas  of 
the  federal  service  has  long  been  notorious.  In  1907  the  situ- 
ation in  the  clerical  employments  in  the  departments  at  Wash- 
ington was  thus  described  by  a  committee  of  officials  appointed 
by  President  Roosevelt  to  inquire  into  the  methods  of  busi- 
ness of  the  government : 

It  is  a  well  known  fact  that  through  all  the  Departments  peo- 
ple are  sitting  side  by  side  doing  the  same  class  of  work  and 
receiving  very  different  compensation.  Some  clerks  doing  the 
simplest  kind  of  work  are,  by  reason  of  length  of  service,  re- 
ceiving high  salaries,  while  young  men  only  recently  certified 
by  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  whose  general  intelligence 
and  ability  soon  cause  them  to  be  assigned  to  the  most  difficult 
work  in  the  office,  have  to  wait  many  years  before  they  re- 
ceive the  recognition  in  salary  that  the  character  of  their 
work  justifies.^ 

Thirteen  years  later  the  Reclassification  Commission  draws 
an  even  stronger  indictment : 

Sometimes  employees  working  side  by  side  doing  the  same 
work  will  be  receiving  rates  of  pay  varying  by  50  per  cent, 
or  even  more.  Often  the  more  efficient  employees  are  paid 
at  the  lower  rates.  Many  instances  can  be  cited  where  the 
clerk  in  charge  of  a  section  or  other  minor  organization  unit 
is  receiving  less  than  other  employees  working  under  his  di- 

*  This  is  not  to  say  that  the  mere  existence  of  a  paper  classification 
will  of  itself  prevent  such  conditions  from  developing;  but  in  its  absence 
they  are  almost  certain  to  develop. 

'  Report  to  the  President  by  the  Committee  on  Department  Methods ; 
Classification  of  Positions  and  Gradations  of  salaries  for  employees  of 
the  Executive  Departments  and  Independent  Establishments  in  Washing- 
ton, 1907,  p.  6. 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  191 

rection.  His  compensation  for  the  added  responsibility  lies 
in  the  fact  that  if  one  of  his  more  highly  paid  subordinates  re- 
signs his  chances  of  getting  the  vacancy  are  excellent.^ 

The  clerical  employments  at  Washington  comprise  by  no 
means  the  only  portion  of  the  federal  service  in  which  these 
conditions  exist.  They  exist  also,  though  perhaps  to  a  less 
pronounced  degree,  in  the  technical  and  professional  employ- 
ments at  Washington,  and  in  the  field  services.  As  an  im- 
portant instance  of  such  failure  may  be  cited  the  internal  reve- 
nue service,  where  upwards  of  three  thousand  persons  are 
employed  under  the  wholly  non-descriptive  title  of  deputy 
collector,  at  salaries  running  from  $900  to  $3,000.  Obviously 
there  must  be  a  world  of  difference  in  respect  to  duties  between 
the  officers  receiving  the  upper  limit  and  the  employees  receiv- 
ing the  lower.  The  former  are,  in  fact,  assistants  to  the  col- 
lectors in  charge  of  the  more  important  collection  districts,  and 
have  important  and  difficult  duties,  both  in  the  supervision  of 
the  office  and  field  forces,  and  in  the  handling  of  difficult  ques- 
tions of  the  application  of  the  laws  arising  in  their  districts. 
The  latter  are  in  some  cases  clerks  employed  on  low  grade 
routine  work,  in  others,  detectives  assigned  to  routine  work 
in  respect  to  infractions  of  the  revenue  laws  applicable  to 
liquor,  opium,  etc.  Between  these  two  extremes,  moreover, 
are  a  small  army  of  employees  performing  duties  of  many  dif- 
ferent shades  of  difficulty  and  responsibility,  susceptible,  owing 
to  the  completely  standardized  nature  of  the  work  performed 
in  the  field  by  the  internal  revenue  service,  of  precise  definition 
and  systematic  classification. 

Perhaps  even  more  inconsistent  with  sound  principles  is 
the  setting-up  of  graded  titles,  apparently  implying  the  ex- 
istence of  a  corresponding  gradation  of  duties,  when  in  fact 
the  compensation  rates  affixed  to  the  several  titles  overlap,  thus 
on  their  face  negativing  the  implication  of  a  grading  of  duties. 
An  instance  of  this  type  of  classification  is  that  prevailing  in 
the  Department  of  Justice  where  "attorneys"  are  found  who 

^  Report  of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  Part  I,  p.  52. 


192  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

receive  but  $2,500,  while  some  "assistant  attorneys"  receive 
as  high  as  $3,500. 

Space  will  not  permit  the  examination  in  this  volume  of 
all  the  inconsistencies  and  imperfections  of  classification  which 
now  obtain  in  this  relatively  simple  matter  of  grading  the  du- 
ties embraced  in  each  given  type  of  service  within  a  given  de- 
partment or  branch.  It  should  be  pointed  out,  however,  that 
almost  without  exception  there  has  been  a  failure  accurately 
to  classify  and  grade  the  duties  involved  in  the  general  types 
of  clerical  work  found  in  the  federal  service.  Aside  from 
such  supervisory  classes  as  are  commonly  designated  in  the 
practice  of  the  federal  service  as  "chief  clerk"  and  "chief  of 
division,"  almost  all  the  clerical  work  of  the  government,  in 
offices  having  a  statutory  roll,  is  performed  under  the  single 
title  of  "clerk,"  with  salaries  ranging  from  $900  to  $2,000. 
Not  only,  as  already  stated,  has  no  attempt  ever  been  made  by 
Congress  to  define  the  grades  of  clerical  duty  which  should 
attach  to  any  given  salary  rate;  so  far  as  available  informa- 
tion indicates  no  such  attempt  has  been  made  by  any  head  of 
department  or  branch,  except  to  a  limited  extent  in  the  Emer- 
gency Fleet  Corporation  and  the  Shipping  Board.  It  is  not 
surprising,  therefore,  that  the  condition  of  gross  inequality  in 
the  relation  between  compensation  and  duty  which  was  cited 
above  as  existing  in  the  clerical  employments  in  the  depart- 
ments at  Washington,  and  which  exists  to  almost  an  equal  de- 
gree in  the  larger  organizations  employing  numbers  of  clerks 
in  the  field,  should  have  come  about. 

The  responsibility  for  the  failure  to  develop  precise  clas- 
sifications for  each  given  class  of  service  in  each  department 
or  branch,  which  has  ensued  almost  universally  over  the  whole 
area  of  the  federal  service,  rests  doubtless  in  large  measure 
ui)on  Congress,  but  in  no  small  measure  also  upon  the  Presi- 
dent and  the  Civil  Service  Commission.  Under  the  general 
power  of  direction  which  the  President  possesses  and  under 
the  power  to  make  rules  with  which  he  is  vested  by  the  civil 
service  act,  he  could  undoubtedly  have  compelled  the  proper 
classification  of  the  several  services,  either  directly  by  the  Civil 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  193 

Service  Commission  or  by  the  departmental  officers  under  its 
direction  and  supervision. 

Lack  of  Inter-Departmental  Uniformity  in  Titles  and  Com- 
pensation Rates. — But  even  if  each  department  or  bureau 
had  developed  and  applied  a  consistent  salary  classification 
for  itself,  uniformity,  the  primary  essential  of  a  classification 
for  the  federal  government,  would  not  have  been  secured.  The 
requirement  of  uniformity  is  simply  that  each  kind  of  service, 
as  for  example,  telephone  switchboard  operating,  or  mechan- 
ical drafting,  shall  be  classified  and  compensated  in  a  uniform 
manner  in  all  the  various  departments,  bureaus,  and  divisions 
of  the  government  in  which  that  service  is  employed.  An 
inequality  in  compensation  rate  for  the  same  service  as  be- 
tween one  governmental  establishment  and  another  is,  of 
course,  far  less  serious  in  its  effect  upon  morale,  and  upon 
the  administration  of  personnel  affairs  generally,  than  is  like 
inequality  within  a  single  branch,  but  it  is  none  the  less  highly 
undesirable.  It  is  manifestly  wrong  in  principle.  At  its  worst 
it  may  represent  an  actual  overpayment  of  the  employee  at 
the  higher  rate,  and  an  actual  underpayment  of  the  employee 
at  the  lower  rate. 

The  inevitable  result  of  the  absence  of  any  central  control, 
coupled  with  the  failure  of  most  of  the  departments  to  develop 
a  cognate  departmental  control  over  its  several  bureaus  and 
offices,  has  been  the  development  of  wide  divergencies  between 
department  and  department,  and  even  l^etween  organizations  in 
the  same  department,  in  the  compenastion  for  the  same  work. 
The  fact  has  long  been  patent,  though  details  have  not  been 
readily  obtainable.  So  far  as  the  departmental  service  at 
Washington  is  concerned,  however,  the  investigations  of  the 
congressional  commission  on  reclassification  have  now  fur- 
nished abundant  evidence. 

The  Commission  finds  that  the  salary  and  wage  rates  for 
positions  in  the  same  class  are  different  in  different  depart- 
ments and  independent  establishments.  The  scale  of  pay  in 
some  departments  is  markedly  higher  than  the  scale  for  the 
same  class  of  work  in  other  departments. 


194  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

The  statistical  evidence  to  support  this  finding  is  super- 
abundant. It  is  to  be  found  in  the  figures  for  almost  every 
numerically  important  class  which  is  represented  in  two  or 
more  establishments.  One  of  the  instances  that  particularly 
impressed  the  stafif  of  the  Commission  as  it  made  its  detailed 
examination  of  the  figures,  in  connection  with  the  recom- 
mendation of  the  Commission  in  respect  to  salaries,  was  that 
of  the  junior  examiners.  They  are  found  mainly  in  the  Bu- 
reau of  War  Risk  Insurance  and  the  Bureau  of  Internal  Reve- 
nue, both  of  the  Treasury  Department,  and  in  the  Pension 
Bureau  and  the  General  Land  Office  of  the  Interior  Depart- 
ment. 

In  the  Interior  Department  the  most  common  rate  f9r 
junior  examiners  was  $1,200,  whereas  in  the  Treasury  De- 
partment two  rates  were  almost  equally  common,  $1,400  and 
$1,800.  The  lower  rate  prevails  in  the  Bureau  of  Internal 
Revenue  and  the  higher  rate  in  the  Bureau  of  War  Risk  In- 
surance. These  figures  are  exclusive  of  bonus,  but  obviously 
such  differences  were  not  offset  by  either  the  bonus  law  which 
was  operative  on  April  30,  1919,  nor  are  they  offset  by  the 
present  law. 

The  Commission  did  not  develop  in  its  report  any  other 
major  instance  of  diversity  of  scales  between  specific  depart- 
ments, though  unquestionably  a  great  variety  of  such  instances 
are  to  be  found  in  the  unpublished  tabulations  made  by  it. 

Coincident  with  the  wide  divergencies  between  the  depart- 
ments in  compensation  scales  has  developed  an  even  wider  di- 
vergency in  the  titles  employed  to  designate  a  given  class  of 
work.  The  investigations  of  the  Reclassification  Commission 
have  made  concrete  what  has  long  been  a  matter  of  general 
knowledge. 

Employees  termed  "Senior  file  and  record  clerks''  in  the 
classification  according  to  the  duties  actually  performed  have 
been  selected  for  the  first  illustration.  This  class  embraces 
2,400  employees.  While  many  of  them  were  described  as 
clerks  of  the  four  classes  and  some  as  "clerk  class  $1,000," 
"clerk  class  $1,100,"  "clerk  class  $1,300,"  and  some  simply 
clerks,  the  positions  of  others  were  described  by  many  dif- 
ferent titles,  105  being  the  total  number  of  different  titles  now 
in  use  for  this  class.  .  .  . 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES   195 

Junior  examiners  have  been  selected  as  a  second  illustra- 
tion. In  this  class  some  500  employees  are  described  at  pres- 
ent by  48  different  payroll  titles.  .  .  . 

Examples  of  many  different  payroll  titles  embraced  under 
a  single  class  title  are  not  limited  to  the  services  involving 
filing  and  examining  work.  They  are  found  in  nearly  all  of 
the  services.  Under  the  title  "J^^^^o^  civil  engineer"  as  the 
correct  occupational  designation,  were  found  positions  carry- 
ing 33  different  payroll  titles  some  of  which  were :  "Clerk, 
Class  III,"  "Chief  draftsman,"  "Valveman,"  "Assistant  clas- 
sifier," and  "Skilled  laborer." 

In  the  class  of  positions,  properly  designated  as  "Associ- 
ate cadastral  engineer"  involving  knowledge  of  United  States 
laws  and  regulations  governing  public  land  patents  as  well 
as  engineering,  were  found  several  employees  whose  positions 
now  carry  the  following  payroll  titles :  "Clerk,"  "Clerk,  Class 
III,"  "Clerk,  Class  IV,"  and  "United  States  surveyor  on  spe- 
cial detail."  Among  those  correctly  classed  as  "Carpenter" 
were  found  some  400  employees  having  at  present  29  different 
payroll  titles.  These  included  "Mechanic,"  "Mechanician," 
"Night  guard,"  "Orderly,"  and  "Clerk,  Class  1200."  .  .  . 

An  examination  of  the  questionnaires  of  1,283  employees 
whose  salaries  are  appropriated  for  under  the  title  of  "Clerk, 
Class  i"  showed  that  they  are  filling  positions  that  call  for  the 
performance  of  97  varieties  of  duties.  A  similar  study  of  the 
questionnaires  of  3,207  "Clerks,  Class  $1,200,"  brought  out 
the  fact  that  they  are  properly  classifiable  in  yj  of  the  classes 
proposed  in  this  report.  This  analysis,  carried  further,  re- 
vealed the  same  condition  throughout  the  whole  range  of  pres- 
ent clerk  classes.^ 

The  Work  of  the  Reclassification  Commission. — For- 
tunately the  Congress  has  recognized  the  necessity  for  some 
action  looking  toward  the  proper  classification  of  the  govern- 
ment employees.  In  the  so-called  Legislative  Appropriation 
Act,  approved  March  i,  1919,^  it  provided  for  the  establish- 
ment of  the  "Joint  Commission  on  Reclassification  of  Sala- 
ries," vv^hich  was  to  consist  of  three  Senators,  members  of  the 
Sixty-fifth  Congress,  to  be  appointed  by  the  President  of  the 
Senate,  and  three  Representatives,  members  of  the  Sixty-fifth 

*  Report  of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  Part  I,  pp.  45-48. 
'40  Stat.  1269. 


196  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Congress,  to  be  appointed  by  the  Speaker  of  the  House.     The 

duties  of  the  Commission  were  thus  laid  down  by  the  act : 

It  shall  be  the  duty  of  the  commission  to  investigate  the 
rates  of  compensation  paid  to  civilian  employees  by  the  munici- 
pal government  and  the  various  executive  departments  and 
other  governmental  establishments  in  the  District  of  Columbia, 
except  the  navy  yard  and  the  Postal  Service,  and  report  by 
bill  or  otherwise,  as  soon  as  practicable,  what  reclassification 
and  readjustment  of  compensation  should  be  made  so  as  to 
provide  uniform  and  equitable  pay  for  the  same  character  of 
employment  throughout  the  District  of  Columbia  in  the  serv- 
ices enumerated. 

The  Commission  was  given  an  initial  appropriation  of 
$25,000,  which  was  later  supplemented  by  an  additional  ap- 
propriation of  $50,000;  and  the  heads  of  the  various  govern- 
mental services  and  the  Commissioners  of  the  District  of  Co- 
lumbia were  directed  to  furnish  office  space  and  equipment, 
detail  officers  and  employees,  furnish  data  and  information, 
and  make  investigations  whenever  requested  by  the  Commis- 
sion. 

The  Commission  began  its  work  in  April,  191 9,  and  sub- 
mitted its  report  to  Congress  on  March  12,  1920. 

Working  Organisation  of  the  Commission. — The  organ- 
ization of  the  Commission  was  as  follows :  all  broad  matters 
of  policy  and  the  fixing  of  the  rates  of  pay  to  be  recommended 
to  the  Congress  were  passed  upon  by  the  Commission  as  a 
whole.  The  three  Representatives,  appointed  by  the  Speaker 
of  the  House,  were  not  members  of  the  Sixty-sixth  Congress 
and  thus  they  were  able  to  devote  all  their  time  to  the  work 
of  the  Commission.  They  exercised  constant  general  super- 
vision over  all  its  activities  and  passed  upon  the  many  de- 
tailed questions  that  arose. 

To  furnish  advice  on  the  technique  of  classification  and 
to  be  directly  responsible  for  the  actual  direction  of  the  clas- 
sification work  proper,  the  Commission  retained  a  company  of 
industrial  engineers  who  had  had  experience  in  similar  work 
in  this  country  both  in  governmental  and  commercial  lines, 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  197 

The  great  body  of  the  Commission's  personnel  was  com- 
posed of  employees  detailed  to  it  by  the  several  departments. 
This  force  was  divided  into  four  principal  divisions,  the  clas- 
sificatioxi  staff  which  was  concerned  with  the  preparation  of 
the  specifications  descriptive  of  the  several  positions,  the  re-, 
search  staff_that  made  most  of  the  economic  and  social  studies 
specially  desired  by  the  Commission  and  prepared  most  of  the 
salary  recommendations  for  consideration  by  the  Commission, 
the  clerical  staff  that  maintained  the' records,  and  the  statis^ 
ticalstaff  that  compiled  the  figures  required  by  the  Commission 
in  respect  to  the  service  as  it  was  on  April  30,  1919. 

The  employees  detailed  to  the  Commission  were  generally 
selected  because  of  some  special  qualifications  for  their  pro- 
posed assignment.  The  organization  thus  brought  to  bear  on 
the  problems  involved,  the  judgment  in  respect  to  matters  of 
policy  of  six  members  or  former  members  of  Congress,  the 
technical  advice  of  persons  experienced  in  the  technique  of 
classification,  and  the  knowledge  possessed  by  the  detailed  staff 
regarding  the  various  governmental  agencies,  procedures,  and 
positions.  In  addition  the  Commission  organized  and  had  the 
assistance  of  a  great  number  of  different  committees  made  up 
of  people  not  on  the  staff  of  the  Commission.  There  were 
committees  for  each  large  organization,  representative  of  the 
employees  and  the  administrators,  committees  on  each  of  the 
more  important  major  subjects  before  the  commission,  rep- 
resentative of  the  public,  the  administrators,  and  the  employees, 
and  committees  on  each  of  the  several  types  of  service  recog- 
nized by  the  Commission.  These  so-called  "service  commit- 
tees" were  given  formal  hearings  at  which  they  presented  their 
criticisms  and  suggestions  regarding  the  specifications  and  their 
recommendations  regarding  salary  scales.  Many  of  these  com- 
mittees devoted  a  large  amount  of  time  to  their  work  for  the 
Commission ;  and  its  report  is  based  on  the  most  far  reaching 
investigation  of  the  personnel  of  the  United  States  Government 
at  Washington  that  has  ever  been  made. 

Method  of  Determining  Position  Specifications. — The 
method  pursued  by  the  Commission  in  developing  its  speci- 


198  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

fications  was  briefly  as  follows :  each  employee  on  the  payroll 
on  April  30,  1919,  was  furnished  with  a  questionnaire  which 
asked,  among  other  things,  "What  work  do  you  actually  per- 
form in  your  position?''  When  the  employee  had  filled  out 
his  questionnaire,  it  was  submitted  to  his  official  superior  who 
was  asked,  "What  is  the  work  actually  performed  by  the  em- 
ployee to  whom  this  questionnaire  was  addressed?"  He  was 
also  asked,  "What  qualifications  do  you  think  applicants  who 
seek  appointment  to  this  position  should  possess  (a)  As  to 
education,  (b)  As  to  length  and  kind  of  practical  experience, 
and  (c)  As  to  personal  characteristics?" 

The  questionnaires  were  submitted  to  the  Commission  in 
the  order  in  which  the  names  appeared  on  the  payroll.  Since 
in  the  government  service  there  is  commonly  no  relationship 
between  organization  units  and  payrolls,  the  first  step  taken 
by  the  Commission,  after  making  sure  that  all  questionnaires 
had  been  received  and  establishing  its  controlling  records,  was 
to  arrange  the  questionnaires  in  true  organization  order,  with 
each  employee's  card  coming  under  that  for  his  immediate 
superior  together  with  those  for  the  other  employees  in  the 
same  unit  doing  the  same  kind  of  work.  Organization  charts 
were  then  prepared,  giving  a  graphic  view  of  the  various  units 
and  the  lines  of  authority. 

The  questionnaires  were  then  symbolized,  by  the  use  of  a 
numerical  code,  to  show  the  distinct  service  or  group  of  closely 
related  services  to  which  they  belonged.  These  services  were 
generally  easily  recognizable  trades,  crafts,  vocations,  or  pro- 
fessions. In  the  clerical  group  the  services  recognized  fol- 
lowed lines  that  reflected  the  functional  organization  lines  ob- 
servable in  many  of  the  government  departments.  An  account- 
ing service  took  care  of  most  of  the  employees  in  the  disbursing 
and  auditing  offices ;  a  supply  and  equipment  service  provided 
for  the  employees  of  the  supply  divisions ;  a  publications  serv- 
ice, for  the  employees  of  the  publications  division ;  a  mail,  file, 
and  record  service  for  the  employees  of  mail  and  file  divisions; 
and  a  personnel  service  for  the  employees  of  the  appointment 
offices.     Special  services  for  stenographers  and  typists,  statis- 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  199 

tical  clerks,  mechanical  tabulating  machine  operators,  office  ap- 
pliance operators,  telephone  and  telegraph  operators  and  mes- 
sengers, with  a  miscellaneous  clerical  service,  provided  a  rough 
plan  for  bringing  together  employees  doing  like  work. 

Until  the  questionnaires  had  been  thus  symbolized  by 
services,  they  were  kept  in  organization  order  so  that  the  state- 
ments on  the  cards  could  be  interpreted  in  the  light  of  the  in- 
formation contained  on  other  cards  in  the  same  organization. 
When  the  greater  part  of  the  symbolizing  had  been  completed, 
the  questionnaires  were  sorted  by  services ;  and  the  question- 
naires for  each  service  were  turned  over  to  the  staff  committee 
which  was  responsible  for  the  preparation  of  the  specifications 
descriptive  of  the  different  classes  of  positions  in  the  particu- 
lar service. 

As  a  general  rule  tentative  class  specifications  were  drawn 
up  by  the  various  committees  in  advance  of  actually  sorting 
the  cards  for  any  service  into  classes.  For  this  purpose  the 
committees  drew  on  several  sources  of  information.  They 
scanned  the  questionnaires  and  since  most  members  of  the 
committees  had  come  from  the  respective  services  concerned, 
they  drew  on  their  own  knowledge  of  the  positions  involved. 
They  consulted  informally  with  officials  and  employees  in  the 
government  service  and  others  in  whom  they  had  confidence. 
Suggestions  were  also  derived  from  study  of  titles  and  speci- 
fications printed  in  the  reports  of  other  modern  classifications. 
These  first  drafts  of  tentative  specifications  were  then  tested 
and  revised  through  the  process  of  actually  using  them  as  a 
basis  for  sorting  the  questionnaires  to  classes. 

The  tentative  specifications  as  thus  drafted  and  tested  by 
the  several  committees  were  reviewed  by  the  headquarters 
staff  and,  as  a  rule,  by  at  least  one  of  the  House  members  of 
the  Commission,  and  when  they  were  regarded  as  reasonably 
satisfactory,  they  were  mimeographed  and  submitted  to  the 
special  service  committees  organized  outside  the  Commission's 
staff  from  among  the  employees  and  the  administrators  who 
were  engaged  in  or  were  especially  concerned  with  the  par- 
ticular type  of  work  involved.     These  committees  were  asked 


20O  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

to  criticize  the  specifications  and  to  make  suggestions  regard- 
ing salaries.  Each  committee  was  asked  to  submit  a  brief 
and  was  given  a  hearing  on  its  l)rief.  The  specifications  were 
revised  in  the  Hght  of  these  criticisms  before  their  final  adop- 
tion by  the  Commission. 

Scope  and  Character  of  Specifications. — For  each  class  of 
positions  recognized  by  the  Commission  there  is  provided : 
(i)  a  brief  descriptive  class  title;  (2)  a  statement  of  the  duties  1 
of  the  position  in  the  class,  and  generally  a  few  specially  se- 
lected examples  illustrative  of  the  duties;  (3)  a  statement  of 
the  qualifications  required  for  entrance  into  the  class ;  and  (4) 
an  indication  of  the  principal  lines  of  promotion  to  and  from 
the  position.  These  four  items  ^niake  up  the  classification 
proper  and  to  them  are  added  the»^^mpensation  rates  recom- 
mended by  the  Commission  for  the  class. 

Priniarv  Unit  of  Classificalion:  the  Class. — The  Commis- 
sion thus  defines  its  "class"  which  is  the  primary  unit  of  its 
work : 

A  "class"  is  a  group  of  all  positions  which,  regardless  of 
their  organization  connection,  or  location,  call  for  the  per- 
formance of  substantially  similar  duties  or  work  and  involve 
the  exercise  of  responsibilities  of  like  importance  and  therefore 
demand  substantially  the  same  qualifications  on  the  part  of 
incumbents,  and  are,  for  these  reasons,  subject  to  common 
treatment  in  the  selection  of  qualified  appointees  and  other  em- 
ployment processes,  and  that  can  be  aptly  described  by  the 
same  title. 

Under  this  system  of  classification,  it  will  be  noted,  no 
efifort  is  made,  in  the  classification  proper,  to  consolidate  into 
grades  employees  doing  dissimilar  work,  believed  by  the  clas- 
sifiers to  be  of  like  value.  Conceivably  certain  classes  of  ac- 
counting clerks  or  bookkeepers,  filing  clerks,  statistical  clerks, 
supply  clerks,  addressing  machine  operators,  and  mechanical 
tabulating  machine  operators  may  all  be  regarded  as  of  like 
value  and  might  be  consolidated  into  a  heterogeneous  grade 
under  some  such  common  title  as  "clerk."  The  Commission 
deliberately  rejected  this  suggestion.     Any  such  grading  sys- 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES   201 

tern  assumes  that  in  the  different  kinds  of  clerical  work  the 
lines  dividing  one  class  from  another  may  be  drawn  arbitrarily 
at  any  point  that  will  fit  the  standard  grading  scheme  adopted, 
and  that  steps  of  exactly  the  same  standard  height  are  ap- 
plicable to  all  kinds  of  clerical  work.  The  Commission  was  of 
the  opinion  that  the  facts  regarding  the  different  kinds  of  cler- 
ical w^ork  were  incompatible  with  this  assumption,  and  that 
the  number  and  the  width  of  the  gradations  would  have  to  be 
determined  on  the  basis  of  the  facts  regarding  the  specific 
work  and  not  on  the  basis  of  a  preconceived  system  of  grades. 

Titles  for  a  heterogeneous  grade,  too,  were  regarded  as 
too  indefinite  to  be  really  descriptive  of  the  positions.  The 
term  "clerk"  for  example,  is  applicable  to  so  many  positions 
at  Washington,  over  50,000  according  to  the  Commission's 
figures,  that  it  has  almost  no  descriptive  value  in  estimates 
and  reports  regarding  the  work  of  the  various  offices.  To 
make  these  estimates  and  reports  specific  and  concrete,  it  was 
regarded  as  necessary  that  titles  should  be  used  that  would  give 
a  much  more  definite  idea  of  the  work  actually  being  per- 
formed. 

In  the  great  majority  of  cases,  therefore,  the  Commis- 
sion used  as  its  primary  unit  a  scientific  class,  made  up  of 
positions  requiring  like  work,  involving  like  responsibilities  and 
requiring  like  entrance  qualifications.  Its  main  departure  from 
this  principle  is  in  its  so-called  "group  classes"  which  are 
found  mainly  in  the  middle  and  higher  ranges  of  the  service 
and  provide  a  single  "group  class"  for  positions  alike  in  re- 
spect to  duties,  responsibilities,  and  general  qualifications  but 
differing  in  respect  to  the  subject  matter  or  the  official  pro- 
cedure of  which  the  employee  must  have  a  thorough  knowl- 
edge. Provision  is  made,  however,  that  a  parenthetical  ad- 
dition shall  be  made  to  the  group  class  title  to  indicate  spe- 
cifically the  exact  nature  of  the  work. 

Practically  all  objects  which  may  be  attained  through  a 
duties  classification  of  positions  may  be  secured  through  one 
that  adopts  as  its  primary  unit  such  a  true,  scientific  class.  It 
would  serve  not  only  for  salary  standardization  but  for  re- 


202  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

cruitment,  promotion,  and  transfer,  and,  in  a  large  measure, 
it  would  furnish  a  standard  terminology  to  be  applied  in  de- 
scriptions of  organizations  and  procedures  and  in  estimates 
and  reports.  It  permits  of  the  arrangement  or  the  combina- 
tion of  these  units  in  a  number  of  significant  ways  and  thus  it 
is  a  good  classification  for  statistical  and  accounting  purposes. 
Arrangement  of  Classes  in  Series  and  Serznces. — In  the 
Commission's  report  the  1,762  classes  it  found  in  the  depart- 
ments and  offices  at  Washington  are  arranged  first  in  "series," 
if  series  are  applicable,  and  in  "services."  It  thus  defines  its 
"Series"  and  "Services." 

Where  a  number  of  "classes"  of  positions  are  substantially 
similar  as  to  the  type  of  work  involved  and  differ  only  in  rank 
as  determined  by  the  importance  of  the  duties,  the  degree  of 
responsibility  involved,  and  the  amount  of  training  and  ex- 
perience required,  such  "classes"  constitute  a  "series,"  and 
each  is  given  a  title  containing  a  common  term  descriptive  of 
the  type  of  work,  with  a  modifying  term  indicative  of  the 
relative  rank. 

A  "service"  is  a  general  aggregation  of  classes  of  posi- 
tions grouped  regardless  not  only  of  departmental  and  organ- 
ization lines,  but  also  regardless  of  rank,  on  the  basis  of  out- 
standing common  characteristics,  selected  more  or  less  arbi- 
trarily to  aid  in  the  process  of  classification.  A  "service" 
includes  positions  belonging  to  a  given  occupation,  vocation, 
calling,  profession,  business,  craft,  trade,  or  group  of  trades — 
a  general  line  of  work. 

The  Commission  did  not  employ  the  sharp  division  into 
Professional,  Sub-professional,  Clerical  and  so  on  that  has 
been  a  feature  of  some  modern  classifications,  and  closely  re- 
sembles the  orthodox  broad  divisions  long  used  in  occupa- 
tional statistics  of  population.  Its  classes,  of  course,  could 
have  been  thus  arranged,  but  it  preferred  the  less  theoretical, 
less  academic  system  of  bringing  together  in  one  place  positions 
in  related  work,  whether  they  were  professional,  sub-profes- 
sional, or  clerical.  Incidentally  this  arrangement  relieved  the 
Commission  of  the  difficult  and  more  or  less  embarrassing 
decisions,    necessarily   made   more   or    less   arbitrarily,    as   to 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  203 

whether  certain  border-hne  classes  of  positions  are  to  be  put 
under  professional,  sub-professional,  or  clerical;  but  its  fun- 
damental purpose  was  to  adopt  an  arrangement  that  would 
facilitate  the  subsequent  use  of  the  classification.  If  one  is 
dealing  with  an  accounting  or  auditing  organization,  one  will 
find  all  the  accounting  and  auditing  positions  in  the  same  place ; 
and  a  like  arrangement  is  adopted  for  statistics,  engineering, 
library  work,  and  other  types  of  work.  In  considering  many 
government  units,  one  finds  the  positions  typical  of  the  or- 
ganization together  instead  of  scattered  through  the  book  un- 
der the  various  broad  divisions.  On  first  inspection  the 
scheme  of  arrangement  adopted  by  the  Commission  is  perhaps 
less  quickly  grasped,  but  after  one  has  become  familiar  with 
it,  it  is  far  simpler  to  use. 

Method  of  Determining  Compensation  Rates. — After  the 
tentative  class  specifications  had  been  developed  by  the  clas- 
sification staff  of  the  Commission,  they  were  submitted  to  the 
research  stafif,  which  used  them  as  a  basis  for  its  study  of  what 
private  employers  were  paying  for  similar  work.  The  ques- 
tionnaires were  tentatively  assigned  or  allocated  to  classes  and 
were  then  submitted  to  the  statistical  staff  which  compiled  sta- 
tistics to  show  what  the  government  itself  was  paying  for  the 
different  classes  of  work  in  the  different  departments  and  in- 
dependent establishments.  The  committees  representing  the 
administrators  and  the  employees  in  the  several  types  of  work 
were  requested  to  submit  what  they  regarded  as  the  proper 
salary  scales.  At  the  request  of  the  Commission,  the  United 
States  Bureau  of  Labor  Statistics  had  made  two  budget  stud- 
ies in  Washington,  the  first  showing  separately  for  men  and 
for  women  what  it  cost  an  individual  to  maintain  himself  or 
herself  in  Washington  and  the  second  what  it  cost  a  family 
of  five  to  live  according  to  a  minimum  standard  of  health  an3 
decency. 

General  figures,  of  course,  were  available  from  oflficial 
sources  regarding  the  increase  in  the  cost  of  living  that  has 
taken  place  over  a  series  of  years  as  well  as  wholesale  and  re- 
tail price  indices,  and  statistics  were  compiled  from  the  Official 


204  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Register  of  the  United  States  to  show  the  movement  of  the 
salaries  of  the  government  employees  in  the  District  of  Co- 
lumbia since  1893. 

After  consideration  of  all  these  factors  the  research  staff 
made  a  recommendation  to  the  Commission.  The  entire  Com- 
mission considered  the  matter  of  salaries  and  had  before  it 
the  specifications  and  all  the  data  that  were  available. 

The  salaries  recommended  by  the  Commission  represent 
the  consensus  of  judgment  of  the  Commissioners  arrived  at 
after  considering  all  the  available  data.  They  do  not  repre- 
sent the  results  of  an  adoption  of  any  particular  theory  for 
salary  adjustments.  Various  theoretical  bases  of  salary  fix- 
ing may  be  urged,  such  as  the  competitive  principle  or  paying 
what  private  employers  pay,  the  minimum  wage  principle,  and 
the  principle  of  increasing  old  rates  by  a  certain  percentage 
to  offset  increased  cost  of  living.  None  of  these  principles 
were  adopted  by  the  Commission;  they  relied  ratlier  on  their 
own  judgment  after  consideration  of  the  facts. 

An  examination  of  the  rates  recommended  by  the  Com- 
mission discloses  that  in  comparatively  few  cases  has  it  sug- 
gested a  rate  below  the  minimum  of  subsistence  for  an  indi- 
vidual, but  that  for  the  great  majority  of  positions  its  rates 
are  below  the  comfort  and  decency  standard  for  a  family  of 
five  as  found  by  the  Bureau  of  Labor  Statistics,  Its  rates,  as 
a  rule,  do  not  by  any  means  offset  the  increase  that  has  taken 
place  in  the  cost  of  living,  and  old  employees  would  not  find 
the  purchasing  power  of  their  salaries  restored  to  what  it  was 
on  their  appointment  if  the  new  rates  were  to  be  adopted. 
For  the  lower  paid  positions  the  recommended  salaries  on  the 
whole  compare  favorably  with  those  in  private  employments. 
In  the  higher  administrative,  clerical,  technical,  and  scientific 
positions,  the  recommendations  are  materially  below  the  sala- 
ries in  commercial  enterprises.  The  salaries  for  technical  and 
scientific  employees  are  more  nearly  on  a  par  with  those  paid 
in  colleges  and  universities.  The  suggested  rates  for  the 
clerical  service  closely  approximate  the  salaries  being  paid  by 
the  government  in  the  more  conservative  of  the  newer  or  the 


] 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  205 

war  expanded  government  agencies.  The  Commission  esti- 
mated that  if  its  recommendations  were  followed,  it  would 
involve  an  increase  of  from  eight  to  ten  per  cent  over  the  salary 
rates  that  were  in  existence  on  April  30,  19 19,  plus  the  $240 
bonus. 

Provision  for  Minimum  and  Maximum  Rates. — In  com- 
mon with  most  modern  classifications,  that  recommended  by 
the  Commission  usually  provides  for  each  class  a  range  of 
compensation  from  minimum  to  maximum  with  specific  steps 
within  the  range.  These  steps  give  opportunity  for  annual 
advancement  until  the  maximum  is  reached  to  those  employees 
within  the  class  whose  efficiency  records  meet  the  standards  of 
efficiency  to  be  established  for  the  different  rates  within  the 
class.  It  was  the  intention  of  the  Commission  that  the  maxi- 
mum rates  should  be  paid  only  to  those  who  have  served  the 
specified  number  of  years  and  have  also  reached  the  maximum 
standard  of  efficiency  set  for  the  class.  The  Commission  thus 
provides  for  that  vital  distinction  between  advancement  in 
pay,  due  to  length  of  service  and  increased  efficiency  in  the 
performance  of  unchanged  duties,  and  promotion,  due  to  the 
assignment  to  higher  duties. 

Legal  Determination  of  Specifications  and  Rates. — The 
Commission  proposed  that  its  specifications  and  salary  ranges 
should  be  submitted  to  Congress  and,  with  such  amendments 
as  the  Congress  might  make,  should  be  written  into  law.  It 
never  seriously  considered  recommending  that  Congress  dele- 
gate to  any  administrative  agency  any  of  its  present  power  over 
salaries.  Its  furthest  recommendation  in  this  direction  was 
that  if  a  new  position  should  be  created  that  could  not  be 
classified  under  the  existing  classification,  the  Civil  Service 
Commission  should  by  order  prescribe  the  qualifications,  du- 
ties, and  rates  of  compensation  for  the  additional  class,  with 
the  proviso  that  the  rates  of  compensation  should  be  in  har- 
mony with  those  established  for  comparable  classes  and  that 
the  Commission  as  soon  as  practicable  should  report  its  action 
to  both  Houses  of  Congress.  The  rates  thus  established  would 
be  in  force  until  and  except  as  altered,  amended,  or  repealed 


2o6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

by  law.^  This  power,  it  will  be  observed,  is  far  less  than  that 
now  delegated  to  administrative  officers  under  lump  sum  ap- 
propriations and  specifically  provides  for  publication  and  for 
an  immediate  report  to  the  Congress. 

Installation  of  Classification. — After  a  classification  estab- 
lishing standard  specifications  and  fixing  standard  salary  ranges 
has  been  adopted  by  legislative  or  administrative  action,  the 
next  step  is  to  put  it  into  actual  operation.  The  main  task 
here  is  to  say,  in  respect  to  each  position,  exactly  where  it  falls 
in  the  classification  on  the  basis  of  the  duties  which  it  involves. 
When  its  duties  are  identified  with  the  appropriate  standard 
description  of  duties,  its  class  and  title  are  fixed  and  the  range 
of  salary  that  is  to  be  paid  the  position  is  automatically  de- 
termined. Two  terms  have  been  used  to  describe  this  process, 
"allocation"  and  "appraisal."  The  Reclassification  Commis- 
sion preferred  "allocation." 

The  initial  allocation  to  the  appropriate  class,  according 
to  the  recommendations  of  the  Reclassification  Commission, 
would  be  made  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  which  would 
submit  its  designations  to  the  department  or  independent  es- 
tablishment involved,  for  criticism  and  review.  The  depart- 
ment would  either  accept  the  allocation  to  the  class  as  made 
by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  or  would  secure  a  hearing 
before  that  body  for  reconsideration.  Final  authority  over 
allocation  would  rest  in  the  hands  of  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission. 

After  the  class  into  which  the  position  belongs  has  been 
determined,  the  remaining  point  is  to  fix  the  exact  salary  rate, 
within  the  range  established  for  the  class,  which  shall  be  paid 
to  the  particular  employee.  Up  to  this  point  the  classifica- 
tion processes  are  concerned  with  the  position  as  distinct  from 
the  employee,  but  here  the  individual  is  taken  into  considera- 
tion. What  is  his  length  of  service  and  what  his  efficiency? 
Under  the  bill  proposed  by  the  Commission  the  heads  of  the 
departments,  subject  to  the  approval  of  the  Commission,  would 
determine  the  exact  rate  to  be  paid  and  would  certify  their 

*  Report  of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  Part  I,  p.  137. 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  207 

findings  to  the  Commission  together  with  the  facts  upon  which 
they  are  based. 

Current  Administration  and  the  Classification. — No  mat- 
ter how  comprehensive  and  definite  the  specifications,  how  just 
the  salary  scale,  and  how  accurate  the  allocations,  a  classi- 
fication cannot  be  made  self -operative.  To  some  agency  or 
agencies  constantly  at  work  must  be  given  the  task  of  seeing 
that  the  actual  personnel  administration  is  in  harmony  with 
the  classification  and  that  the  classification  and  the  salary  ranges 
are  well  adapted  to  meet  conditions,  not  as  they  were  when 
the  fundamental  classification  legislation  was  adopted,  but  as 
they  are  at  the  moment.  The  problem  is  dynamic,  and  little 
progress  can  be  made  through  legislation  that  treats  it  as  static. 
The  Reclassification  Commission  clearly  recognized  the  im- 
perative need  for  a  central  administrative  agency,  and  being 
adverse  to  the  creation  of  any  new  one,  it  recommended  that 
the  Civil  Service  Commission,  enlarged  and  improved,  be 
charged  with  the  duty  of  administering  and  enforcing  the  clas- 
sification and  with  the  responsibility  of  recommending  to  Con- 
gress changes  in  the  established  specifications  and  salary  ranges. 

The  Commission's  recommendations  in  respect  to  the  ad- 
ministration of  the  classification  were  not  based  on  any  careful 
analysis  of  the  ideal  distribution  of  functions  among  the  dif- 
ferent governmental  agencies,  now  existing  or  properly  to  be 
created,  which  are  concerned  with  the  various  aspects  of  clas- 
sification. At  the  time  it  was  preparing  its  report,  many 
people  regarded  the  prospects  for  the  creation  of  a  Bureau  of 
the  Budget  and  the  adoption  of  a  sound  method  of  financial 
administration  as  fairly  remote,  and  naturally  the  Commission 
did  not  wish  to  submit  a  report  that  would  make  reclassifica- 
tion contingent  upon  budgetary  reform.  Budget  reform,  re- 
organization, improvement  in  business  practice,  and  reclas- 
sification are  all  necessary  processes  in  putting  the  government 
on  a  business  basis  and  they  are  closely  interrelated.  The 
Commission,  however,  probably  very  properly,  interpreted  its 
mandate  from  Congress  as  giving  it  jurisdiction  over  only 
one  of  them  and  it  framed  its  recommendations  so  that  they 


2o8  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

would  make  classification  effective  with  the  least  possible 
change  in  matters  only  indirectly  related  to  personnel  admin- 
istration. 

The  classification  proper,  as  recommended  by  the  Com- 
mission, is  unquestionably  based  on  sound  fundamental  prin- 
ciples, and  the  Commission's  general  attitude  in  salary  fixing 
was  apparently  eminently  practical.  No  one  would  attempt, 
of  course,  to  say  that  the  classification  is  free  from  errors  in 
detail  and  that  there  are  no  inconsistencies  and  inequalities  in 
the  salary  scales.  The  Commission  itself  said,  'The  task  as- 
signed to  your  Commission  by  the  Congress  was  the  largest  of 
its  kind  ever  undertaken,  and  your  Commission  is  not  suf- 
fering from  any  illusions  as  to  the  degree  of  perfection  at- 
tained." The  errors  and  inconsistencies,  such  as  they  may  be, 
however,  are  in  details  which  may  be  easily  amended  and  cor- 
rected, and  it  would  unquestionably  be  a  distinct  step  in  ad- 
vance if  such  a  classification,  amended  and  perfected  in  the 
light  of  the  detailed  criticism  which  has  developed  since  its 
publication,  should  be  adopted  for  the  government  service. 

Such  a  broad  endorsement  of  the  classification  proper  and 
of  the  general  attitude  of  the  Commission  in  respect  to  salary 
fixing,  however,  does  not  imply  an  endorsement  of  the  recom- 
mendations of  the  Commission  respecting  its  administration. 
At  a  time  when  the  entire  question  of  the  administration  of 
government  is  being  reviewed,  it  would  be  well  for  the  Con- 
gress to  approach  reclassification  as  one  of  several  related  re- 
forms and  to  make  it  as  nearly  as  possible  ideal  rather  than  to 
attempt  as  did  the  Reclassification  Commission  to  make  it 
fit  the  existing  system  with  the  least  amount  of  change  in 
procedure. 

Classification  and  Appropriation  Technique. — A  fundamen- 
tal question  which  the  Reclassification  Commission  report  does 
not  squarely  face  is  the  relationship  between  the  classification 
system  and  the  appropriation  acts,  a  question  which  in  its 
broader  aspects  is  in  reality,  "What  control  shall  the  Congress 
exert  over  the  expenditures  for  personal  services?" 

The  classification  could  be  applied  to  existing  lump  sum 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  209 

appropriations  without  any  radical  modification  of  the  pres- 
ent practice.  The  administrators,  in  submitting  their  estimates 
of  the  needs  for  the  following  year,  would  use  in  their  de- 
tailed supporting  statements  the  standard  terminology  of  the 
classification,  and  the  standard  salary  rates  instead  of  the 
present  undefined  terminology  and  unstandardized  rates.  The 
administrators  would  be  no  more  bound  to  follow  the  plan 
indicated  in  their  supporting  statements  than  they  are  at  pres- 
ent, but  if  they  departed  from  that  plan,  they  would  have  to 
do  so  within  the  terms  of  the  classification.  Herein  lies  the 
marked  difference  between  the  two  systems;  the  present  one 
is  one  of  uncontrolled  lump  sums  whereas  the  proposed  one 
would  impose  control  through  the  classification. 

Difficulty  would  be  encountered  in  applying  the  classifica- 
tion under  the  existing  statutory  system,  because  classification 
would  deprive  it  of  the  little  elasticity  it  now  possesses.  The 
administrator,  though  hampered  in  the  conduct  of  his  work  by 
the  rigid  prescription  of  the  exact  number  of  positions  he  may 
have  and  the  exact  salary  he  may  pay,  manages  to  get  along 
under  the  system  because  he  is  practically  free  to  attach  to  any 
position  any  duties  he  may  choose.  If  the  appropriation  act 
fixed  the  duties  too,  he  would  be  bound  absolutely  by  a  law 
adopted  several  months  in  advance  of  the  beginning  of  the 
actual  performance  of  the  work. 

The  validity  of  the  objection  to  a  detailed  duties  classifica- 
tion, that  it  is  inapplicable  under  a  strict  statutory  system  of 
appropriating  for  positions,  depends  in  no  small  measure  on 
the  real  value  of  that  type  of  appropriation.  In  favor  of  it, 
the  point  is  made  that  it  gives  Congress  control  over  the  ex- 
penditures for  services.  Attention  should  be  called  to  the 
fact  that  it  gives  control  to  Congress  over  the  salary  the 
administrator  shall  pay  for  a  position  but  it  gives  Congress 
no  control  over  what  kind  of  services  the  administrator  shall 
get  for  the  money.  For  its  proper  administration  it  requires 
that  the  Congressional  committees  each  year  shall  go  into 
the  work  of  each  office  in  fairly  minute  detail  and  have  a 
thorough   understanding  of   its  precise   situation,   something 


2IO  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

for  which  the  committees  have  no  time  and  which,  if 
they  should  attempt,  would  get  them  so  lost  in  detail  that 
they  never  would  clearly  grasp  the  larger  issues.  Not  having 
time  to  do  the  work  thoroughly,  the  committees  are  inclined 
to  approve  what  was  done  last  year  with  slight  modifications, 
whereas  W'hat  really  may  be  needed  is  a  radical  revision  of  the 
whole  situation.  The  Congress  exercises  rigid  control  but  does 
so  more  or  less  perfunctorily. 

Whatever  may  be  the  opinion  of  members  of  Congress  in 
respect  to  the  value  of  this  particular  type  of  control,  the  al- 
most universal  opinion  among  administrators  and  other  gov- 
ernment employees  is  that  it  is  at  present  one  of  the  main  im- 
pediments to  good  administration.  Under  it  personnel 
administration  degenerates  into  a  mere  game  of  keeping  all 
the  statutory  positions  filled  all  the  time.  From  month  to 
month  the  number  of  employees  does  not  vary  with  the  load 
which  the  office  is  carrying.  Failing  to  fill  vacancies  in  a  lull 
does  not  leave  more  money  available  to  meet  periods  of  pres- 
sure. Any  money  saved  by  not  filling  vacancies  reverts  to 
the  Treasury  and  it  is  a  more  or  less  generally  accepted  axiom 
of  the  game  that  if  money  is  turned  back  the  fact  will  be  used 
as  evidence  that  the  appropriation  is  too  large.  The  tendency, 
therefore,  is  to  develop  the  statutory  staff  to  the  point  where 
it  will  carry  the  maximum  load  and  to  keep  it  at  this  point  re- 
gardless of  the  real  recjuirement  of  the  work. 

The  statutory  roll  is  peculiarly  an  impediment  to  good 
personnel  administration,  because  under  it  salaries  can  be  ad- 
vanced and  promotions  can  be  made  only  when  vacancies  occur 
or  when  Congress  creates  new  positions  or  increases  salaries. 
The  only  immediate  reward  for  the  deserving  and  efficient 
employee  is  the  moral  satisfaction  of  having  done  a  good  job, 
and  the  hope  that  when  a  vacancy  occurs  his  services  will  be 
recognized.  If  a  position  becomes  vacant  and  two  employees 
by  working  hard  demonstrate  their  capacity  to  carry  the  work 
of  the  vacant  position  in  addition  to  their  own,  they  do  not 
necessarily  gain  anything  by  it.  The  administrator  cannot 
divide  any  part  of  the  salary  of  the  vacant  position  between 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  211 

them.  The  statutory  system  offers  Uttle  inducement  to  an 
employee  to  exert  himself.  .  When  a  vacancy  does  occur  only 
one  person  of  the  class  immediately  below  can  be  selected  for 
it;  and  the  administrator  has  to  choose  between  several  de- 
serving people.  One  gets  the  promotion  and  the  others  are 
disappointed.  In  each  grade  below  the  vacancy,  one  person 
ordinarily  gets  an  advancement,  not  because  that  represents 
a  fair  distribution  of  rewards  on  the  basis  of  merit  or  in  the 
interests  of  the  office,  but  because  that  is  the  only  course  open 
under  the  statutory  system.  A  few  years  under  this  system 
is  deadly  to  many  employees,  for  it  substitutes  for  a  normal, 
healthy  ambition  to  get  ahead  a  peculiar  type  of  governmental 
fatalism.  Much  of  the  individual  inefficiency  in  the  govern- 
ment service  is  the  direct  result  of  the  statutory  system  of 
appropriations. 

Perhaps  the  greatest  merit  of  a  sound  duties  classification 
is  that  it  would  permit  of  the  substitution  of  a  controlled  lump 
sum  appropriation  for  the  present  indefensible  statutory  roll. 
It  would  likewise  give  control  over  the  lump  sum  appropria- 
tions for  services  which  are  at  present  ineffectively  controlled 
if  controlled  at  all. 

The  natural  question  at  this  point  is,  "How  is  the  control 
to  be  secured  through  the  classification?"  The  consensus  of 
opinion  undoubtedly  is  that  some  agency  or  agencies  must  be 
given  at  least  inspectional  powers  to  see  that  the  classification 
is  enforced. 

On  first  thought  it  might  seem  as  if  the  question  of  whether 
a  given  position  is  necessary  or  not  is  really  not  one  of  clas- 
sification. The  Congress,  however,  will  doubtless  take  the 
position  that  some  device  must  be  created  to  prevent  the  de- 
velopment of  top-heavy  organizations  with  too  many  high  po- 
sitions and  not  enough  low  ones.  A  weakness  of  some  gov- 
ernmental agencies  at  present  is  that  there  has  not  been  a 
sufficient  division  of  labor  and  each  employee  performs  all 
the  processes,  both  high  grade  and  low,  that  are  necessary  to 
the  work.  As  a  consequence  all  the  employees  must  be  quali- 
fied to  perform  the  more  difficult  processes.     A  division  of 


212  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

labor  might  permit  of  the  employment  of  a  relatively  small 
number  of  highly  qualified  persons  to  devote  all  their  time  to 
the  more  difficult  processes  while  a  body  of  less  well  qualified 
assistants  relieved  them  of  routine  processes.  If  this  ques- 
tion is  not  inquired  into  fairly  regularly,  a  tendency  may  grow 
up  to  distribute  the  difficult  work  over  a  large  number  of  po- 
sitions so  that  all  the  incumbents  may  qualify  for  the  higher 
positions  in  the  classification.  The  statutory  roll  does  not  pre- 
vent this  defective  type  of  organization  at  all,  but  it  does  pre- 
vent any  large  number  of  employees  from  being  paid  for  the 
higher  duties.  To  no  small  degree  this  failure  to  provide  for 
any  division  of  labor,  combined  with  a  statutory  roll,  accounts 
for  the  fact  that  in  the  same  office  one  employee  will  be  getting 
a  very  much  larger  salary  than  another  for  exactly  the  same 
work  and  that  the  lower  paid  employee  may  be  the  more  efficient 
of  the  two. 

At  present,  responsibility  for  proper  organization  and  pro- 
cedure rests  primarily  upon  the  administrative  officers  and 
secondarily  upon  the  Congress,  and  more  particularly  upon  its 
committees.  The  proposal  is  to  give  the  function  of  review- 
ing the  organization  and  procedure  in  detail  to  the  Budget 
Bureau.  The  Budget  Bureau  apparently,  therefore,  would  be 
the  proper  agency  to  say  in  the  first  instance  whether  or  not 
a  position  is  necessary  for  the  prosecution  of  a  given  under- 
taking. Its  findings  and  recommendations  on  this  point,  of 
course,  would  be  subject  to  review  by  Congress  and  its  com- 
mittees, but  it  should  be  the  agency  constantly  at  work  and 
adequately  equipped  to  pass  on  questions  of  organization  and 
management. 

If  the  Bureau  of  the  Budget  were  charged  with  the  admin- 
istration of  the  classification,  the  Congress  could  require  that 
administrators  in  departing  from  the  estimates  underlying 
lump  sum  appropriations  should  secure  the  approval  of  the 
Bureau  of  the  Budget.  The  Bureau  of  the  Budget  could  by 
general  rule  give  authority  for  the  numerous  minor  and  more 
or  less  inconsequential  changes  that  are  eminently  desirable, 
requiring  merely  a  report  of  the  action  taken,  while  it  reserved 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  POSITIONS  AND  SALARIES  213 

for  individual  consideration  the  departmental  proposals  for 
really  major  changes. 

Although  it  would  seem  as  if  the  Bureau  of  the  Budget 
should  ultimately  administer  the  classification,  it  does  not  nec- 
essarily follow  that  it  should  have  exclusive  jurisdiction  over 
its  initial  installation.  Installation  will  be  a  large  undertaking 
requiring  a  considerable  temporary  force  and  during  the  proc- 
ess many  questions  will  come  up  requiring  interpretation  of 
the  law..  It  will  be  a  very  different  undertaking  from  admin- 
istering the  classification  after  it  has  been  adopted  and  installed. 
To  assign  the  initial  installation  to  the  Bureau  of  the  Budget 
at  the  very  outset  of  its  career  is  to  cause  it  no  little  embarrass- 
ment. It  would  also  involve  giving  to  one  man  authority 
to  pass  on  questions  that  need  the  broader  point  of  view  that 
comes  from  a  representative  board  or  commission.  One  possi- 
bility that  would  seem  worthy  of  consideration  is  that  the  in- 
itial installation  should  be  made  by  a  commission  representative 
of  the  Congress,  the  head  of  the  Budget  Bureau  and  possibly 
of  the  employees,  and  that  after  the  installation  is  completed 
the  subsequent  administration  should  be  in  the  hands  of  the 
Budget  Bureau. 

General  Summary  of  Classification. — In  concluding  this 
chapter  on  classification,  it  seems  desirable  to  summarize  briefly 
the  essential  features  of  a  good  system. 

The  first  requisite  is  a  good  classification  of  all  positions 
on  the  basis  of  duties  and  responsibilities.  This  classification 
should  contain  for  each  class  of  positions  found  (a)  a  brief 
distinctive  and  descriptive  title  (b)  a  concrete,  definite  descrip- 
tion of  the  duties  and  responsibilities  of  the  positions,  il- 
lustrated where  necessary  by  selected  examples,  and  (c)  a 
clear  statement  of  the  minimum  qualifications  for  entrance.  The 
classification  should  avoid  in  so  far  as  possible  the  consolida- 
tion of  positions  with  unlike  duties  into  non-homogeneous 
grades,  believed  by  the  classifiers  to  be  of  like  value,  and  should 
use  as  its  primary  unit  a  class  made  up  of  positions  involving 
like  duties  and  responsibilities,  and  requiring  like  qualifications 
on  entrance. 


214  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

The  second  essential  is  a  fair  and  equitable  salary  scale, 
determined  after  a  careful  consideration  of  the  various  factors 
involved,  such  as  (a)  the  training  and  skill  required,  (b)  the 
degree  of  responsibility,  (c)  the  salaries  previously  paid  by  the 
government,  {d)  the  salaries  paid  for  similar  work  in  other 
employments,  and  (e)  the  cost  of  living.  This  salary  scale 
should  establish  for  all  but  exceptional  classes,  a  range  of  sal- 
aries between  a  minimum  and  a  maximum  to  permit  of  suit- 
able recognition  of  length  of  service  and  increased  efficiency. 

The  third  requisite  is  that  the  classification  should  be  in- 
stalled by  a  central  agency  with  an  adequate  staff  so  that  there 
may  be  uniformity  of  interpretation  in  its  installation  in  the 
several  departments. 

The  fourth  requirement  Is  that  a  central  agency  with  an 
adequate  staff  shall  be  given  power  to  see  that  the  administra- 
tive officers  observe  the  classification.  It  should  have  power  to 
classify  positions.  With  respect  to  the  selection  of  individuals 
to  fill  the  positions  where  they  are  taken  from  within  the 
service,  it  should  have  authority  to  investigate  the  action  of 
administrators  and  to  report  thereon  to  the  head  of  the  Depart- 
ment, the  President,  and  the  Congress  as  the  facts  may  warrant. 
It  should  have  authority  subject  to  the  subsequent  approval 
of  the  Congress  to  prepare  specifications  for  new  positions 
which  must  be  immediately  created  and  which  cannot  be  classi- 
fied in  existing  classes  and  it  must  have  power  temporarily  to 
fix  salaries  for  them. 

The  final  requisite  is  that  the  Congress  shall  consider  classes 
of  positions  as  a  unit  and  not  individual  positions  and  individual 
employees  when  it  fixes  salaries. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

SELECTION   BY   PROMOTION    FROM   WITHIN   VERSUS 
RECRUITMENT   FROM   WITHOUT 

When  the  several  classes  and  grades  of  work  required  have 
been  defined,  the  compensation  rates  fixed,  and  the  specific  posi- 
tions established  and  appraised,  there  next  presents  itself,  in 
the  theoretical  analysis  of  personnel  administration,  the  prob- 
lem of  determining  the  method  of  selection  to  be  employed  for 
filling  the  several  positions  established. 

Methods  of  selection  are  basically  two  in  number — selection 
from  without  the  service,  or  recruitment,  and  selection  from 
within  the  service,  embracing  reassignment  and  promotion.^ 
The  problem  goes,  however,  much  deeper  than  the  mere  techni- 
cal choice  between  detailed  methods.  It  goes  to  the  nature  of 
the  whole  personnel  system.  Upon  its  answer,  as  much  as 
upon  any  other  factor,  and  perhaps  more,  depends  the  attrac- 
tiveness of  the  service,  the  ultimate  caliber  of  the  personnel 
recruited  and  retained,  and  its  morale.  If  compensation 
standards  be  regarded  as  the  foundation  of  the  personnel  sys- 
tem, the  lines  of  promotion  and  the  levels  of  recruitment  con- 
stitute its  framework. 

^  The  distinction  between  reassignment  and  promotion,  as  herein 
used,  is  merely  that  the  one  does  not,  and  the  other  does,  imply  a  change 
in  grade  on  the  part  of  the  employee  affected.  The  term  "promotion" 
is  thus  used,  not  in  its  loose  sense  as  embracing  every  increase  in  com- 
pensation, but  in  its  narrow  sense,  covering  only  advancement  from  one 
position  to  a  higher  position,  the  duties  of  which  are  clearly  higher.  It 
should  be  noted  that,  as  used  in  the  present  chapter  and  throughout  this 
volume,  the  term  promotion  embraces  a  change  from  one  position  to 
another  of  higher  grade,  whether  in  the  same  department  or  in  another 
department.  It  is  fairly  common  in  federal  personnel  discussion  to 
confine  the  term  promotion  to  advancement  within  the  lines  of  a  par- 
ticular department,  bureau,  or  branch,  and  to  speak  of  advancement  not 
sp  confined  as  a  transfer,  or,  occasionally,  a  transfer  involving  promo- 
tion. From  the  present  standpoint,  however,  such  a  change,  is  equally 
with  a  change  taking  place  wholly  within  the  lines  of  a  single  organiza- 
tion unit,  a  promotion ;  or,  if  further  description  be  needed,  it  may  be 
termed  a  promotion  involving  transfer. 


2i6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Case  for  Selection  by  Promotion  from  Within  the  Service. 

— While  the  question  under  discussion  is  commonly  termed  that 
of  recruitment  versus  selection  from  within,  it  should  be  noted 
at  the  outset  that  the  real  choice  presented  is  between  a  competi- 
tion open  to  all,  including  those  in  the  service,  and  a  competi- 
tion confined  to  those  in  the  service.  Only  in  the  rarest  in- 
stances are  those  already  in  the  service  barred  from  competing 
on  the  same  terms  as  those  outside  for  any  position  that  may 
be  thrown  open  to  general  competition;  and  in  the  federal 
service  such  a  restriction  is  entirely  unknown.  The  question 
really  to  be  considered  is  thus  the  extent  to  which  it  may  be 
desirable,  definitely,  and  as  a  matter  of  policy,  to  restrict  se- 
lection to  those  within  the  service,  rather  than  open  it  to  a 
general  competition  in  which  those  in  the  service  are  obliged 
to  compete  with  those  outside  the  service. 

By  way  of  warning  it  should  be  said  that  the  use  of  the 
term  "restriction  of  selection  to  those  within  the  service"  is 
not  intended  to  imply  that  the  decision  must  be  made  irre- 
vocably between  selection  from  within  and  general  competition. 
If  selection  from  within  has  been  determined  upon,  but  upon 
closer  scrutiny  of  the  several  possible  candidates  within  the 
service  it  appears  that  none  of  them  possesses  thedesired  qualifi- 
cations in  sufficient  degree,  general  competition,  of  course, 
may  still  be  invoked.  In  a  few  branches  of  the  service  it  will 
be  found  indeed  that  an  ironclad  rule  prevails  which  limits 
selection  to  those  within  the  service  regardless  of  the  opinion 
which,  at  the  particular  time  a  vacancy  arises,  may  be  held  by 
the  responsible  administrative  officers  as  to  the  capacity  of  those 
in  the  service  from  among  whom  selection  must  be  made.  At 
a  subsequent  point  the  condition  prevailing  in  those  services 
will  be  set  forth,  and  the  general  question  of  the  desirability  of 
an  ironclad  rule  of  this  kind  under  certain  conditions  discussed. 

The  obvious  reason  why  the  restriction  of  selection  to 
those  in  the  service  may  be  urged  as  a  matter  of  principle 
is  that  it  increases  the  opportunity  for  advancement  within 
the  service,  and  still  more,  that  it  gives  those  in  the  service  a 
definite  assurance  that  under  given  conditions   advancement 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  217 

will  come.  The  anticipated  results  in  terms  of  a  better  class 
of  personnel  recruited  and  retained  in  the  lower  ranks,  and  a 
better  morale,  are  obvious.  Great  as  is  the  desirability,  in  any 
personnel  system,  of  multiplying  and  widening  the  avenues 
for  advancement  to  the  greatest  extent  possible,  it  is  especially 
necessary  in  the  personnel  systems  of  governments  where  at 
best  the  opportunities  for  advancement  are  not  apt  to  be  as 
great  as  in  private  undertakings. 

Almost  as  important  as  the  frequency  and  adequacy  of  the 
opportunity  for  advancement  is  its  certainty.  It  is  in  the  high- 
est degree  desirable,  in  a  well  established  service,  that  the  per- 
sonnel should  have  a  definite  assurance  that,  unless  an  extraor- 
dinary reason  compels  a  resort  to  outside  selection,  vacancies 
in  the  higher  grades  will  be  filled  from  within  the  service.  Such 
an  assurance,  by  making  definite  the  vague  expectation  of  pro- 
motion as  a  reward  for  faithful  and  zealous  service,  is  of  im- 
measurable value  for  working  morale. 

Closely  allied  to  this,  but  worth  mentioning  specifically  be- 
cause so  often  overlooked,  is  the  fact,  already  alluded  to  in  the 
preceding  chapter,  that  if  advancement  is  certain,  compensation 
rates,  especially  in  the  lower  positions,  may  be  kept  at  a  lower 
level  than  otherwise  without  hardship,  since  pressure  will  not 
be  present  in  so  great  a  degree  to  increase  the  compensation  of 
employees  of  long  service  who  have  been  unable  to  secure  ad- 
vancement. 

The  obvious  objection  to  a  consistent  restriction  of  selection 
to  those  already  in  the  service  is  that  it  so  severely  narrows  the 
area  of  selection.  This  is  particularly  applicable  to  the  higher 
posts,  since  at  this  level  first  rate  ability  is  in  any  case  rare 
and  hard  to  find.  Unquestionably  where  the  restriction  of  se- 
lection for  the  highest  posts  to  those  already  in  the  service  is  i;a 
force,  it  not  infrequently  results  in  the  selection  of  a  less  capa- 
ble or  brilliant  officer  than  could  have  been  found  outside  the 
service.  But  against  the  resulting  loss  of  individual  efficiency- 
is  to  be  set  the  increased  efficiency,  due  to  better  morale  and 
greater  incentive,  displayed  by  the  rank  and  file  of  the  service, 
and  the  intermediate  officers.    The  knowledge  that  the  highest 


2i8  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

posts  may  be  the  reward  of  faithful  and  zealous  service  is  a 
force  making  for  a  day-to-day  productiveness  often  far  mor(^ 
valuable  than  any  results  that  may  be  achieved  by  the  chief  ex- 
ecutives, however  able,  with  a  force  but  mildly  interested  in 
its  work. 

Again,  it  is  arguable  that,  regardless  of  the  relative  effi- 
ciency of  the  personnel  which  may  be  recruited  from  without 
the  service  as  against  that  which  may  be  promoted  from  within, 
adherence  to  selection  solely  from  within  the  service  leads  to 
stagnation  and  conservatism ;  that  frequent,  or  at  any  rate 
occasional,  injection  of  new  blood  into  a  system,  particularly  at 
or  near  the  top,  is  highly  desirable.  There  can  be  no  question- 
ing the  force  of  this  contention ;  and  it  is  undeniable  that, 
despite  the  unmitigated  condemnation  which  has  been  wholly 
justifiably  visited  upon  the  practice  of  filling  chief  local  offices 
with  political  appointees,  occasionally  one  of  these  appointees, 
like  the  proverbial  new  broom,  has  swept  his  organization  clean 
of  mossgrown  procedures  and  traditions  which  the  permanent 
personnel,  with  an  affection  born  of  long  association,  had 
tenderly  cherished.  It  may  be  contended  that  such  a  result  is 
to  be  obtained,  but  with  much  greater  frequency  and  certainty, 
by  the  filling  of  the  higher  posts  with  men  from  outside  the 
service,  of  proved  capacity  and  courage. 

Without  in  any  degree  depreciating  the  force  of  this  con- 
tention, it  should  always  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  occasional 
injection  of  directing  personnel  from  without  represents  a 
merely  sporadic  attempt  to  cure  a  condition  which  is  capable 
of  prevention.  Where  a  proper  incentive  to  efficiency  and  to 
progress  exists  throughout  a  service,  and  such  central  control 
and  supervision  as  will  expose,  by  periodic  survey  and  ap- 
praisal, as  well  as  by  current  contact,  unprogressiveness  or 
incapacity  of  the  directing  personnel  as  soon  as  it  appears,  it 
is  perfectly  possible  to  prevent  stagnation  at  the  top  from  de- 
veloping; and  only  occasionally  will  conditions  get  to  a  point 
where  there  is  imperative  need  of  regeneration  by  one  un- 
fettered by  any  previous  familiarity  with  the  organization.  In 
this  view,  to  the  extent  that  stagnation  exists  at  the  top  in  the 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  219 

federal  service  it  is  chargeable  to  an  improper  system  of  ad- 
ministration in  the  large,  and  should  be  corrected  by  a  revision 
of  that  system  rather  than  by  attempting,  at  irregular  and 
accidental  intervals,  to  galvanize  the  sluggish  organism  into 
action. 

Nor  should  the  fact  be  lost  sight  of  that  the  stagnation  of 
the  subordinate  personnel,  which  results  from  the  lack  of  op- 
portunity for  advancement,  is  no  less  hurtful  to  efficiency  than 
is  stagnation  in  higher  quarters. 

The  considerations  reviewed  up  to  this  point  have  to  do 
solely  with  the  actual  efficiency  of  the  service.  There  frequently 
enters  into  the  discussions  of  this  question  a  consideration  of 
another  sort,  however,  one  that  has  to  do  with  the  relation  of 
the  administrative  personnel,  as  a  class,  to  the  rest  of  the 
community.  The  natural  tendency  of  a  system  in  which  the 
rule  of  selection  from  within  is  accepted  as  a  guiding  principle 
is  to  make  entrance  to  the  service  practicable  for  the  most  part 
only  at  or  near  the  lowest  ranks.  This  in  turn  tends  to  restrict 
entrance  to  those  in  early  life;  and  this  tendency  is  often  re- 
enforced,  especially  in  Europe,  by  the  fixing  of  a  low  maximum 
age  limit  for  entrance.  It  is  felt  by  many  that  a  system  of 
this  type  tends  to  develop  an  official  caste — that  it  draws  so 
clear  a  line  between  those  who  have  adopted  the  public  service 
as  a  career,  and  those  who  have  not,  and  are  consequently  for- 
ever excluded  from  entering  it,  as  to  make  of  the  official  body 
a  class  apart  from  the  community,  irresponsive  to  public  opin- 
ion; or  even  overbearing  and  arbitrary. 

This  feeling  underlies  the  vague  objection  so  often  made 
to  a  "closed"  personnel  system — that  it  leads  to  a  "bureau- 
cracy." When  this  epithet  is  hurled,  it  is  often  the  bureaucracy 
of  the  former  German  Empire,  or  more  particularly  of  the 
former  kingdom  of  Prussia,  that  is  in  mind.  It  needs  no 
arduous  study  of  the  differences  between  that  country  and  the 
United  States  in  the  distribution  of  governmental  powers  and 
in  social  structure  to  make  clear  that  no  analogy  can  be  usefully 
drawn  from  them.  The  position  of  the  official  class  in  the 
Central  Empires  was  but  one  phase  of  their  peculiar  system  of 


220  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

social  and  political  organization.  Apart  from  that  social  or 
political  system  it  could  not  have  existed. 

Turning  to  England  and  France,  where  the  distribution 
of  political  power  has  been  upon  the  same  democratic  basis  as 
in  this  country,  and  where  the  social  structure  also  (though 
still  possessing  many  of  the  hierarchical  characteristics  of  Ger- 
man society)  has  been  nearer  our  own,  we  find  a  completely 
"closed"  personnel  system  which  is  yet  in  no  respect  a  caste 
or  a  class  apart.  Distinct  and  well  recognized  as  is  the  civil 
career  in  those  countries,  there  is  no  apparent  tendency  for  the 
civil  officers  and  employees,  as  a  class,  to  stand  apart  from  the 
rest  of  the  body,  social  or  political,  or  to  assume  a  position  of 
undue  dominance  or  authority  in  public  affairs. 

In  view  of  the  intangible  character  of  the  considerations 
just  reviewed,  their  application  to  concrete  conditions  is  by 
no  means  simple.  The  extent  to  which  the  restriction  of  selec- 
tion to  those  in  the  service  may  properly  be  carried  in  each 
particular  branch  of  the  service  and  each  class  of  positions 
presents  one  of  the  most  difficult,  yet  most  interesting,  of  prob- 
lems in  the  whole  field  of  personnel  administration.  The  prob- 
lem is  to  determine,  for  each  particular  position,  the  prob- 
abilities of  finding  within  the  service,  under  normal  conditions, 
substantially  as  competent  a  person  as  can  be  found  outside 
the  service;  and,  if  the  chances  are  unfavorable,  to  decide 
whether  the  general  values  which  inhere  in  the  principle  of  se- 
lection from  within  are  sufficient  to  outweigh  the  inferiority 
in  the  quality  of  the  service  in  that  particular  position  which 
the  application  of  the  principle  of  selection  from  within  may 
entail.  The  guiding  principle  would  seem  to  be  that  selection 
should  be  restricted  to  those  in  the  service  unless  it  is  made 
to  appear  that  a  substantially  better  class  of  service  will  be  ob- 
tained by  resorting  to  general  competition. 

The  actual  probability  of  finding  within  the  service  eligible 
material  for  promotion  that  will  compare  favorably  with  what 
is  available  outside,  will  be  the  net  resultant,  of  course,  of  the 
whole  system  of  personnel  administration — the  success  which  it 
has  achieved  in  recruiting  good  material,  in  retaining  it,  and 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  221 

in  developing  it  in  service;  and  the  determining  factors  will 
thus  be  not  merely  or  indeed  chiefly  current  ones,  but  will  de- 
rive from  practices  and  conditions  present  a  decade  or  even 
a  generation  ago.  It  is  thus  quite  possible  that,  were  all  the 
higher  offices  now  filled  by  political  appointment  forthwith 
placed  upon  a  merit  basis,  the  application  of  the  principle  of 
selection  from  within  the  service  could  for  some  time  be  made 
to  these  posts  only  after  careful  examination  in  each  instance. 
The  very  fact  that  there  has  not  been,  up  to  the  present,  in 
the  federal  service,  an  opportunity  in  many  lines  of  service  to 
rise  to  the  highest  ranks  has  served  to  deter  from  entermg 
the  service  some  of  the  material  most  eligible  for  promotion 
to  those  ranks,  and  to  produce,  in  many  branches  of  the 
service,  a  personnel  lacking  in  the  qualities  of  leadership  and 
executive  capacity.  This  condition,  doubtless,  would  make  it 
somewhat  difficult  for  some  time  to  apply  rigorously  the  prin- 
ciple of  selection  from  within  the  service. 

The  practicability  of  confining  selection  to  those  in  the 
service  will  also  obviously  depend  upon  the  length  of  time  the 
particular  branch  of  the  service  has  been  in  existence  and  the 
rate  at  which  it  has  grown.  In  the  government  at  the  present 
time  are  to  be  found  not  a  few  services  which  may,  in  the 
course  of  time,  reach  a  condition  in  which  substantially  all 
the  positions  of  advanced  rank  could  be  filled  by  promotion, 
but  which  have  not  yet  attained  that  condition,  having  expanded 
at  a  rate  far  in  excess  of  any  possibility  of  supplying  the  per- 
sonnel of  advanced  rank  by  promotion  from  the  lower  ranks. 
An  excellent  example  of  a  service  of  this  kind  is  the  Bureau 
of  Internal  Revenue.  The  specialized  nature  of  the  work  of 
this  service  and  the  many  gradations  of  skill  and  experience 
which  are  required  in  its  performance  will  make  it  entirely 
possible  in  the  course  of  time,  should  such  a  course  be  decided 
upon,  to  recruit  substantially  the  entire  personnel  of  this  service 
at  three  or  four  levels,  all  of  them  relatively  low,  corresponding 
perhaps  to  the  titles  of  clerk,  examiner,  junior  accountant,  and 
law  clerk.  It  will  be  possible  to  recruit  at  each  of  these  grades 
persons  with  little  or  no  previous  practical  experience,  to  in- 


222  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

struct  them  in  the  work  of  the  service,  and  from  this  force 
to  develop  by  gradual  promotion  all  the  higher  grades  of  execu- 
tives, expert  accountants,  auditors,  and  lawyers  that  the  service 
may  require.  But  in  the  period  just  passed,  when  the  service 
has  multiplied  itself  manifold  in  the  course  of  a  couple  of 
years,  such  a  course  would  have  been  obviously  impossible. 

In  view  of  the  variable  factors  involved,  it  is  manifestly 
impossible  to  dogmatize  upon  the  extent  to  which  selection 
from  within  should  be  insisted  upon  in  any  particular  branch 
of  the  service,  or  for  any  particular  class  of  positions.  At  each 
point  the  decision  must  be  based  upon  a  detailed  study  of  the 
conditions  prevailing  and  likely  to  prevail  in  each  branch  of 
the  service  for  each  class  of  work,  supplemented  when  neces- 
sary by  an  appraisal  of  the  caliber  of  the  material  actually  avail- 
able. One  line  of  cleavage  is,  however,  fairly  obvious.  On 
the  one  side  lie  those  classes  of  service,  and  those  graded  series 
of  positions,  in  which  all,  or  essentially  all,  the  equipment  neces- 
sary for  the  higher  positions  is  naturally  and  regularly  obtained 
by  the  employee  in  his  progress  through  the  lower  positions. 
On  the  other  side  fall  those  classes  of  service,  or  those  graded 
series  of  positions,  in  which  there  is  required  for  the  higher 
positions  an  educational  equipment,  whether  general  or  techni- 
cal, and  in  some  cases  even  a  type  of  practical  experience,  not 
obtainable  in  the  work  of  the  lower  grades.  It  need  hardly 
be  said  that  the  line  of  demarcation  between  these  two  classes 
of  cases  is  by  no  means  clear-cut  at  all  points.  For  purposes 
of  discussion,  however,  the  distinction  is  entirely  practical. 

With  respect  to  those  classes  of  service  which  lie  clearly 
within  the  first  class,  the  principle  would  seem  to  be  wholly 
clear;  selection  from  within  is  to  be  the  rule  in  all  ordinary 
cases.  Only  when  extraordinary  circumstances  demand  is  re- 
cruitment to  be  resorted  to.  To  what  extent  does  this  principle 
now  find  recognition  in  the  federal  service? 
Existing  Conditions:  Positions  in  the  Natural  Line  of 
Promotion. — Curiously  enough,  it  is  only  in  the  unclassified 
service,  in  those  two  classes  in  which  selection  has  been 
put  upon  a  merit  basis  that  the  principle  of  selection  from 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  223 

within  for  positions  in  the  natural  Hne  of  advancement  has  re- 
ceived explicit  recognition.  In  the  medical  corps  of  the  Public 
Health  Service,  and  in  the  Diplomatic  and  Consular  Service, 
in  the  one  case  by  statute,  in  the  other  by  executive  order, 
selection  from  within  is  made  the  invariable  rule,  from  which 
the  administrative  officers  may  not  depart.^ 

Over  the  remainder  of  the  unclassified  service,  there 
exists  no  formal  basis  of  selection  whatever.  No  statute 
or  executive  order  controls  the  discretion  of  the  admin- 
istrative officer  in  making  his  choice  between  recruitment  and 
selection  from  within.  The  same  is  true,  needless  to  say,  of 
the  classified  positions  in  the  excepted  or  non-competitive 
classes.  In  respect  to  the  classified  competitive  service,  the 
civil  service  act  gives  no  recognition  whatever  to  the  principle 
that,  other  things  being  equal,  selection  from  within  is  to  be 
preferred  to  recruitment.  No  provision  of  the  act  is  designed 
to  limit  the  freedom  of  the  appointing  officer  in  this  respect. 
Public  Health  Service. — In  the  Public  Health  Service,  the 
statute  ^  provides  that  original  appointment  to  the  commis- 
sioned medical  corps  shall  be  only  to  the  rank  of  assistant  sur- 
geon, and  that  an  assistant  surgeon  can  be  promoted  to  the 
next  grade — that  of  passed  assistant  surgeon — only  after  four 
years'  service.  While  the  speed  with  which  a  passed  assistant 
surgeon  may  be  advanced  through  the  successively  higher 
grades  is  not  restricted  by  statute,  the  intent  of  the  provision 
is,  of  course,  to  establish  a  graded  system  with  appropriate 
periods  of  service  in  each  grade  before  advancement  to  the 
next ;  and  the  regulations  which  have  been  promulgated  by  the 
President  on  this  head  so  provide.^ 

*  In  the  case  of  the  Diplomatic  and  Consular  Service  the  appointing 
officer  is  nominally  the  President  and  the  executive  orders  which  he  has 
issued  governing  that  service  might  be  regarded,  therefore,  as  being  merely 
for  his  own  guidance.  Since  the  selection  is,  however,  as  set  forth  in  a 
subsequent  chapter,  actually  out  of  his  hands,  it  is  from  a  practical  stand- 
point correct  to  regard  the  executive  orders  in  question  as  constituting  a 
limitation  on  the  discretion  of  the  State  Department. 

*Act  of  January  4,  1889,  25  Stat.  639. 

*  The  periods  of  service  required  in  each  grade  by  these  regulations 
for  eligibility  for  promotion  to  the  next  grade  are  as  follows :  service  as 
assistant  surgeon,  four  years;  as  passed  assistant  surgeon,  eight  years;  as 
surgeon,  until  a  vacancy  occurs  above. 


224  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Assistant  surgeons  and  passed  assistant  surgeons  must 
pass  a  written  and  physical  examination  before  they  can  be 
promoted.  If  they  fail  in  the  first  examination  they  are  given 
a  second  one  at  the  end  of  one  year.  If  they  fail  in  the  second 
examination  they  are  reported  to  the  Secretary  of  the  Treas- 
ury as  not  qualified  for  promotion  and  their  resignations  are 
requested.  Vacancies  in  the  grade  of  senior  surgeon  are 
filled  according  to  seniority  after  a  review  of  the  officer's  record 
and  a  physical  examination.  Assistant  Surgeons  General  are 
in  charge  of  the  divisions  of  the  Service  at  Washington. 
They  are  selected  by  the  Surgeon  General  and  detailed  from 
the  regular  commissioned  personnel.  The  detail  is  for  four 
years,  after  which  they  may  be  again  detailed  for  four  years ; 
after  the  expiration  of  the  second  detail  they  are  not  eligible 
for  a  third  detail  unless  they  shall  have  served  four  years  at 
some  other  duty.  At  the  expiration  of  their  detail  they  return 
to  the  grade  and  number  they  would  have  occupied  if  not 
assigned  as  chiefs  of  division.  The  position  of  Assistant 
Surgeon  General  at  Large  is  filled  by  the  appointment  of  an 
officer  who  has  served  as  Surgeon  General  or  of  a  senior 
surgeon  according  to  seniority,  after  a  physical  examination 
and  a  review  of  the  officer's  record  while  in  the  service.  The 
Surgeon  General  is  one  of  the  officers  who  is  appointed  by  the 
President. 

Specifically,  the  present  statute  makes  it  impossible  for  the 
Service  to  bring  into  its  regular  commissioned  personnel  a  spe- 
cialist of  standing,  however  desirable  or  necessary  his  employ- 
ment might  be.  The  statute  does  not  indeed  prohibit  the  em- 
ployment of  such  a  physician  by  the  Service;  in  fact,  physi- 
cians are  appointed  attending  specialists,  or  acting  assistant 
surgeons,  but  they  stand  outside  the  regular  medical  corps  of 
the  Service  and  are  not  eligil)le  for  promotion  within  its  ranks.^ 
Whether  this  condition,  to  date,  has  ever  proved  an  embarrass- 
ment to  the  Service  is  not  known;  but  even  if  it  has  not,  the 

^  In  1918  Congress  autliorized  the  creation  of  a  Public  Health  Serv- 
ice Reserve,  to  which  physicians  may  be  commissioned  in  any  grade. 
(Act  of  October  27,  iyi8,  40  Stat.  1917.)  On  June  30,  1920,  there  were 
438  reserve  oflicers  on  active  duty. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  225 

statutory  rule  should  never,  in  a  matter  of  this  kind,  be  so 
absolute. 

The  statute  in  question  has  been  in  force  for  about  25  years ; 
so  that  all  the  present  higher  personnel  of  the  service  has  thus 
been  selected  by  promotion  from  within.  The  recognized  ef- 
ficiency of  that  personnel  would  make  academic  any  discussion 
of  the  wisdom  of  restriction  of  selection  to  those  within  the 
service  as  a  general  policy,  even  if  such  discussion  were  called 
for  on  principle,  which  it  is  not,  since  this  is  a  type  of  service 
in  which  few  of  the  objections  to  rigid  adherence  to  selection 
from  within  have  much  force.  Nevertheless  it  is  worth  point- 
ing out  that  of  all  the  services  of  the  government  the  Public 
Health  Service  is  by  no  means  the  one  which  might  have  been 
expected  to  be  selected  for  the  sole  application,  by  statute,  of 
the  unalterable  rule  of  selection  from  within.  There  would  be 
far  more  reason  (though  such  a  course  would  by  no  means  be 
inherently  desirable)  in  filling  some  of  the  higher  positions  in 
the  Public  Health  Service  by  the  appointment  of  distinguished 
public  health  experts  from  without  the  service  than  in  filling 
the  highest  places  in  the  postal  service,  or  the  internal  revenue 
service,  or  other  cognate  services,  from  outside. 

It  should  be  pointed  out,  however,  that  there  is  in  the 
Public  Health  Service,  a  "scientific  personnel"  consisting  of 
sanitary  engineers,  chemists,  bacteriologists,  zoologists,  etc. 
On  June  30,  1920,  the  number  of  scientific  employees  num- 
bered 178  in  comparison  with  200  commissioned  medical 
ofiEicers.  The  salaries  paid  the  scientific  personnel  are  com- 
mensurate with  those  paid  to  the  commissioned  officers.  The 
regulations  provide  for  six  classes  of  the  scientific  personnel, 
and  for  periodic  promotions  after  examination.  Appoint- 
ments are  ordinarily  made  only  to  the  lowest  grade,  but  pro- 
vision is  made  for  original  appointment  to  the  higher  grade, 
if  the  applicant  has  had  previous  experience  particularly  adapt- 
ing him  to  the  special  duties  that  he  is  expected  to  perform. 
Diplomatic  Service. — In  the  diplomatic  service  the  prin- 
ciple of  restricting  selection  to  those  within  the  service  hardly 
may  be  said  to  have  much  room  for  application,  since  the  posi- 


226  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

tions  of  chief  of  mission  (that  is,  ambassador  or  minister)  are 
filled  commonly,  as  already  seen,  by  politics  rather  than  merit, 
so  that  the  highest  position  in  the  permanent  service  is  that  of 
diplomatic  secretary  of  class  one,  of  which  the  salary  is  $3,000. 
So  far  as  applicable  the  principle  is,  however,  recognized  in 
the  regulations  of  1909,  by  which  the  system  of  appointment 
and  promotions  in  the  diplomatic  service  was  established,  by  the 
provision  (Section  3)  that  "initial  appointments  from  outside 
the  service  to  secretaryships  in  the  diplomatic  service  shall  be 
only  to  the  classes  of  third  secretary  of  embassy,  or,  in  cases 
of  higher  existent  vacancies,  of  second  secretary  of  legation,  or 
of  secretary  of  legation  at  such  post  as  has  assigned  to  it  but 
one  secretary.  Vacancies  in  the  secretaryships  of  higher  classes 
shall  be  filled  by  promotion  from  the  lower  grades  of  the 
service,  based  upon  efficiency  and  ability  as  shown  in  the 
service." 

Consular  Service. — By  the  regulations  promulgated  by 
President  Roosevelt  in  1906,  all  the  higher  positions  in  the 
consular  service  beginning  with  the  grade  of  Consul  Class  7 
(of  which  the  salary  is  $3,000)  ^  must  be  filled  by  promotion 
from  the  lower  ranks  of  the  consular  service  (embracing  the 
two  lowest  classes  of  consuls,  and  consular  assistants,  interpre- 
ters, and  consular  clerks),  or  from  positions  in  the  Department 
of  State.  These  regulations  are  less  drastic  in  their  exclusion 
of  the  possibility  of  filling  the  higher  posts  from  without  the 
service  than  are  those  governing  the  Public  Health  Service; 
for  the  permitted  entrance  levels  are  higher,  and,  what  is  more 
important,  no  requirement  is  fixed  of  a  given  length  of  service 
in  any  given  grade  before  promotion.  The  regulations,  there- 
fore, do  not  on  their  face  prevent  the  entrance  of  a  person  into 
one  of  the  lower  consular  ranks,  or  into  the  State  Department, 
and  his  very  speedy  elevation  by  "promotion"  to  one  of  the 
highest  grades  in  the  consular  service,  a  procedure  which  might 
preserve  the  appearance  but  would  grossly  violate  the  principle 

*  Or  under  a  recent  amendment  to  the  statutes  and  consular  regula- 
tions, beginning  with  the  grade  of  vice-consul  dc  carricrc  of  Class  II  of 
which  the  salary  is  $2,750. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  227 

of  promotion  as  opposed  to  recruitment.  Despite  the  absence 
of  regulations,  however,  the  tradition  is  well  established,  and 
has  not  been  departed  from  in  recent  years,  that  promotion  to 
a  higher  rank  shall  come  only  after  a  measurable  length  of 
service  in  the  rank  next  below  and  in  due  course. 

It  will  be  noted  that  in  both  the  services  just  discussed, 
the  recognition  of  the  principle  of  selection  from  within  has 
taken  the  extreme  form  of  a  mandatory  rule,  admitting  of  no 
exceptions,  even  under  extraordinary  circumstances.  Gen- 
erally speaking,  the  incorporation  of  any  principle  of  personnel 
practice  in  an  ironclad  rule,  which  can  be  departed  from,  if 
at  all,  only  with  the  greatest  difficulty,  is  manifestly  undesir- 
able. It  is  almost  always  better  to  restrict  the  statute  or  bind- 
ing regulation  to  a  mere  enunciation  of  the  principle,  leaving 
some  discretion  in  its  application  in  the  hands  of  the  central 
personnel  authority.  The  principle  of  selection  from  within  is 
no  exception  to  this  rule.  Only  in  the  very  clearest  cases  would 
it  seem  desirable  to  enact  that  principle  in  a  form  beyond  the 
reach  of  the  ordinary  processes  of  personnel  administration. 

In  this  view,  even  an  executive  order  would  seem  too  un- 
yielding a  form  for  this  purpose ;  while  its  incorporation  in 
statute  is  manifestly  wrong.  Whatever  may  be  thought  of  the 
wisdom  of  applying  the  principle  of  selection  from  within  so 
rigorously  to  the  Public  Health  Service,  there  can  be  no  ques- 
tion that  the  enactment  of  that  principle  by  statute,  leaving  no 
possibility  of  any  departure  from  the  rule  except  by  special 
act  of  Congress,  is  improper. 

Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey. — The  appointment  of  the  com- 
missioned officers  of  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  by  the 
President,  by  and  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate, 
was  first  provided  for  by  the  Act  of  May  22,  1917,^  which 
stated  that  "no  person  shall  be  appointed  aid  or  shall  be  pro- 
moted from  aid  to  junior  hydrographic  or  geodetic  engineer 
or  from  junior  hydrographic  or  geodetic  engineer  to  hydro- 
graphic  or  geodetic  engineer  until  after  passing  a  satisfactory 
mental  and  physical  examination  conducted  in  accordance  with 

^40  Stat.  88, 


228  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

regulations  prescribed  by  the  Secretary  of  Commerce,  except 
that  the  President  is  authorized  to  nominate  for  confirmation 
the  assistants  and  aids  in  the  service  on  the  date  of  the  passage 
of  this  act."  While  this  act  does  not  state  specifically  that 
original  appointment  must  be  to  the  lowest  grade,  it  accom- 
plishes this  by  indirection  by  providing  for  appointment  in 
the  higher  grades  through  promotion  from  the  lower  ones. 
The  regulations  provide  that  an  aid,  the  lowest  rank  in  the 
commissioned  service,  shall  be  appointed  by  promotion  from 
the  position  of  junior  engineer,  deck  officer,  or  observer,  who 
are  "appointed  by  the  Secretary  of  Commerce  from  a  list  of 
eligibles  established  by  competitive  examinations  conducted  in 
accordance  with  the  rules  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service 
Commission." 

Examining  Force:  Patent  Office. — Though  legal  provi- 
sion for  selection  by  promotion  has  been  made  in  only  the 
three  services  mentioned,  this  method  had  been  firmly  estab- 
lished in  a  number  of  other  services  through  tradition.  In 
perhaps  no  service  within  the  federal  government  or  elsewhere 
is  the  principle  of  restricting  selection  to  those  within  the 
service  more  rigorously  adhered  to  than  in  the  case  of  the  ex- 
amining force  of  the  Patent  Office.  For  many  years  it  has 
been  in  general  the  custom  for  every  member  of  that  force,  to 
enter  the  service  as  an  assistant  examiner  of  the  lowest  grade, 
all  positions  in  the  higher  ranks,  up  to  the  rank  of  examiner- 
in-chief,  being  filled  by  promotion  from  the  rank  next  below. 
Yet  nothing  in  any  statute,  departmental  order  or  even  office 
order  prevents  the  appointment  of  a  person  from  outside  the 
service  to  any  grade  in  the  examining  corps  that  the  Secretary 
may  desire.  In  recent  years  the  tradition  of  restricting  selec- 
tion to  those  in  the  service  has  been  extending  itself  to  the 
positions  of  examiner-in-chief,  which  are  presidential  posi- 
tions, and  is  even  beginning  to  give  promise  of  extension  to 
the  offices  of  Assistant  Commis.sioner  and  Commissioner. 
Postal  Service. — The  postal  service  is  perhaps  an  even 
more  remarkable  instance  of  the  consistent  observance  of  the 
principle  of  selection  from  within,  resting  on  tradition  alone. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT         229 

By  tradition  the  postal  service  has  but  a  single  level  of  recruit- 
ment— the  lovi^est.  Aside  from  the  postmasters  of  the  first, 
second,  and  third  class  offices,  who  were,  until  recently,  all 
political  appointees,  and  aside  from  the  chief  positions  in  the 
department  at  Washington,  all  postal  officers  enter  the  service 
as  clerks  or  carriers.  Curiously  enough,  in  his  order  of  March 
4,  191 7,  establishing  the  system  of  competitive  selection  for 
presidential  postmasters,  President  Wilson  gave  no  recogni- 
tion whatever  to  the  principle  of  selection  from  within ;  estab- 
lishing instead  a  system  of  open  competitive  examination.^ 
No  reason  has  been  given  officially  for  the  adoption  of  the  open 
competitive  rather  than  the  promotional  method  for  these 
posts.  The  position  of  assistant  postmaster,  a  position  which 
is  in  the  larger  cities  far  more  difficult  and  responsible  than 
that  of  postmaster  in  the  great  majority  of  post  offices,  has 
now  for  some  years  been  filled  by  promotion  from  within  the 
service;  and  the  important  and  responsible  position  of  division 
superintendent  of  railway  mail  is  likewise  so  filled.  The 
recognition  of  this  principle  in  the  selection  of  postmasters 
thus  would  not  have  involved,  except  in  the  case  of  the  larger 
cities,  any  real  raising  of  the  level  to  which  competitive  em- 
ployees might  rise.  So  long  as  the  four-year  tenure  remains 
in  force,  it  would  be  difficult,  of  course,  to  secure  the  whole- 
hearted competition  of  many  of  the  most  capable  of  the  per- 
manent employees ;  for  some  would  hesitate  to  take  the  chance 
of  being  dropped  at  the  expiration  of  the  statutory  term.  The 
same  difficulty  is  present,  however,  in  securing  the  competition 
of  the  best  qualified  persons  outside  the  service.  The  Presi- 
dent, therefore,  pending  the  enactment  of  legislation  placing 
all  postmasterships  in  the  non-presidential  class,  with  indefi- 
nite tenure  (thus  making  them  a  part  of  the  classified  competi- 
tive service),  should  convert  the  present  system  of  open  com- 
petition for  postmasterships  to  one  of  promotion. 

The  view  here  taken  differs  from  that  of  the  National  Civil 

^  Moreover  the  nature  of  the  tests  and  standards  which  have  been 
developed  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  for  the  conduct  of  examina- 
tions under  this  order  have  not  been  such  as  to  give  any  advantage  to 
those  with  experience  in  the  postal  service. 


230  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Service  Reform  League,  or  at  least  of  its  officers.  In  a  letter 
to  the  President,  written  in  1919,  called  forth  by  certain  rumors 
then  current  as  to  pending  changes  in  the  system  of  selection 
for  presidential  postmasterships,  the  officers  of  the  League 
said: 

Objections  lie  against  the  promotion  to  the  important  of- 
fice of  Postmaster  without  examination  of  an  employee  within 
the  department.  The  fact  that  there  is  no  promotion  system 
worthy  of  the  name  in  the  federal  service  is  not  a  valid  reason 
why  the  executive  should  acquiesce  in  the  free  selection  from 
within  the  service  to  an  office  of  the  responsibilities  of  presi- 
dential postmaster.  Here  again  the  proposed  change  would 
subject  the  President  and  the  Postmaster  General  to  importu- 
nities from  Senators,  Congressmen,  and  organizations  of  em- 
ployees for  the  appointment  of  particular  individuals.^ 

To  follow  this  reasoning  is  difficult.  The  system  of  pro- 
motion from  within  is  now  applied  and  for  some  years  has 
been  applied  to  positions  in  the  postal  service  far  exceeding 
in  importance  the  position  of  postmaster  at  many,  if  not  most, 
of  the  presidential  offices.  The  League  has  never  taken  ex- 
ception to  this  system  of  selection,  except  in  so  far  as  it  has 
taken  the  general  position  that  some  system  of  promotion 
should  be  devised  not  only  for  the  postal  service,  but  for  the 
federal  service  as  a  whole  which  would  make  certain  the  elimi- 
nation of  political  considerations  in  promotions.  Consistency 
would  seem  to  require  that  the  same  position  should  be  taken 
with  respect  to  presidential  postmasterships.  They  are  pe- 
culiarly positions  to  which  the  subordinate  postal  employees 
should  be  able  to  aspire.  The  correction  of  present  conditions 
is  not  to  be  sought  in  the  application  of  open  competition  where 
promotion  is  appropriate,  merely  because  the  present  procedure 
in  open  competitive  examination  affords  better  protection 
against  improper  influences  than  does  the  present  procedure 
in  promotion.  The  remedy  lies  rather  in  the  development  of  a 
procedure  in  promotion  that  is  adequate. 

Nor  is  it  entirely  certain  that  even  without  any  further 

^  Good  Government,  vol.  36,  p.  15. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT         231 

development  of  the  promotion  procedure,  the  result  apparently- 
feared  I)y  the  League  would  ensue.  It  is  not  generally  un- 
derstood to  be  the  fact  that  under  present  conditions  the  selec- 
tion of  assistant  postmasters  or  superintendents  of  mail  or  de- 
livery in  the  larger  post  offices  is  to  any  important  extent  the 
subject  of  solicitation  or  importunity  by  Congressmen  or  or- 
ganizations of  employees  on  the  part  of  particular  individuals. 
It  is  difficult  to  see  why  these  elements  should  be  any  more 
active  in  the  case  of  presidential  postmasters  once  those  posi- 
tions are  placed  upon  a  merit  basis.  The  fact  that  the  confirma- 
tion of  the  Senate  would  be  required  for  the  promotion  of  a 
postal  employee  to  a  presidential  postmastership  may  indeed 
be  advanced  as  a  reason  why  such  a  result  should  ensue.  It 
is  believed,  however,  that  with  a  promotion  system  properly 
safeguarded  as  in  the  open  competitive  system  now  in  force, 
the  confirmation  of  the  Senate  would  become  a  mere  formality. 
So  far  as  the  available  evidence  indicates,  no  attempt  is  now 
made  by  the  Senators  in  whose  hands  the  confirmation  lies  to 
intervene  on  behalf  of  any  one  particular  individual. 

The  Civil  Service  Commission,  in  successive  annual  re- 
ports, has  gone  on  record  as  favoring  the  selection  of  all  "presi- 
dential" officers  on  a  merit  basis.  One  of  the  principal  con- 
siderations urged  by  the  Commission  has  been  that  unless  this 
action  is  taken  it  is  impossible  to  make  the  service  a  "career," 
which  would  seem  to  imply  that  once  the  positions  in  question 
were  placed  upon  a  merit  basis  they  would  normally  be  filled 
from  within.  Respecting  postmasterships,  however,  the  Com- 
mission, in  a  recent  public  statement,^  has  taken  the  position 
that  "there  should  be  no  iron-bound  rule  that  all  positions  of 
postmaster  should  be  filled  through  the  promotion  of  subordi- 
nates. In  the  opinion  of  the  Commission  such  a  policy  would 
not  be  in  the  best  interests  of  the  service  and  would  not  be 
sustained  by  public  sentiment." 

^  Letter  to  the  Washington  Evening  Star,  February  i8th,  1920,  com- 
menting on  an  article  relative  to  the  filling  of  the  postmastership  of 
Boston  by  open  competitive  examination,  and  the  barring  of  the  assistant 
postmaster  from  the  examination  because  of  failure  to  meet  the  "ex- 
perience" requirement. 


232  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

The  position  has  already  been  taken  in  the  foregoing  pages 
that  an  "iron-bound"  rule  requiring  the  filling  of  higher  posi- 
tions through  the  promotion  of  subordinates  is  appropriate 
only  in  very  few  cases.  It  would  be  difficult,  however,  to  find 
a  class  of  positions  to  which  such  a  rule  could  more  properly 
be  applied  than  the  position  of  postmaster.  The  position  is 
one  which,  in  the  nature  of  the  case,  cannot  require  a  person 
with  a  specialized  knowledge  or  experience  obtainable  only  out- 
side the  service  itself.  On  the  contrary  it  is  only  within  the 
service  itself  that  the  specialized  knowledge  and  experience  re- 
quired can  be  obtained.  If,  then,  the  service  is  unable  to  de- 
velop among  its  enormous  resources  sufficient  executive  ability 
to  be  equal  to  the  demands  of  even  the  largest  post  offices,  the 
difficulty  is  with  the  system  of  recruitment,  compensation,  as- 
signment, promotion,  etc.,  and  these  radical  difficulties,  which 
would  reflect  themselves  through  the  whole  personnel  of  the 
service,  at  all  levels,  could  be  ameliorated  in  no  appreciable 
degree  by  the  selection  of  a  postmaster  from  time  to  time  from 
without  the  service. 

In  point  of  fact,  despite  the  low  level  to  which  recruitment 
to  the  postal  service  is  confined,  despite  the  wholly  inadequate 
compensation  standards  which  have  obtained  in  recent  years, 
and  despite  the  failure  to  provide  sufficient  opportunity  for  the 
subordinate  administrative  personnel  to  gain  experience  by 
progressing  from  smaller  to  larger  offices,  there  is  no  warrant 
for  believing  that  even  at  the  present  time  sufficiently  good  ma- 
terial cannot  be  found  in  any  of  the  larger  offices  to  make  the 
resort  to  general  competition  for  the  position  of  postmaster 
necessary. 

The  restriction  of  recruitment  to  the  postal  service  to  the 
grade  of  carrier  or  clerk  is  believed  to  be  undesirable  in  that 
it  affords  no  opportunity  for  the  entrance  into  the  service  of 
recruits  of  better  educational  equipment  than  are  ordinarily 
likely  to  enter  the  positions  specified,  resulting  in  a  smaller 
amount  of  suitable  material  for  promotion  to  the  higher  admin- 
istrative posts.  This  aspect  of  the  matter  will  be  considered  in 
a  subsequent  section  of  this  chapter  in  connection  with  a  con- 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  233 

sideration  of  the  general  question  of  the  proper  levels  at  which 
recruitment  should  be  permitted.  Here  it  need  only  be  pointed 
out  that  if  the  lowness  of  the  entrance  level  in  fact  does  pro- 
vide insufficient  administrative  material,  the  deficiency  may  be 
made  up  by  resorting  to  open  competition  for  some  of  the  sub- 
ordinate administrative  posts  rather  than  for  the  very  highest 
administrative  posts  in  the  service — those  of  postmaster. 
War  and  Navy  Departments. — A  special  phase  of  the 
problem  of  selection  from  within  presents  itself  in  the  case 
of  the  War  and  Navy  department.  Here  is  found  a  condition 
in  which  the  advancement  of  the  personnel  is  checked  at  a 
given  level,  not  merely  relatively,  as  it  is  by  the  resort  of  gen- 
eral competition,  but  absolutely  by  the  filling  of  all  the  higher 
administrative  posts  by  the  designation  of  military  and  naval 
officers.  Since  entrance  to  the  officers  corps  of  either  of  these 
services  is  impossible  in  peace  times  except  through  the  regular 
course  of  training  early  in  life  at  the  military  or  naval  academy,^ 
or  through  original  appointment  to  the  lowest  grade  after 
examination,  the  system  of  filling  important  administrative 
and  technical  posts  in  the  staff  branches  of  the  military  and 
naval  establishments  with  military  or  naval  officers  necessarily 
results  in  an  absolute  stratification  of  the  service. 

The  question  is  presented,  therefore,  to  what  extent  this 
system,  so  pernicious  from  the  standpoint  of  personnel  ad- 
ministration, is  justified  by  the  needs  of  the  military  and  naval 
establishments.  Properly  to  answer  this  question  would  in- 
volve a  consideration  of  the  whole  theory  of  military  versus 
civilian  functions  in  the  conduct  of  these  two  establishments. 
Some  go  so  far  as  to  assert  that  all  functions  of  purchase  and 
supply,  from  the  point  of  initial  estimating  and  planning  to 
the  point  of  actual  delivery  to  the  depots  maintained  by  the 
forces  in  the  field,  are  essentially  civilian  in  their  character,  and 

^  In  both  the  Army  and  Navy  the  medical  and  dental  officers  are  ex- 
cepted from  this  statement  and  in  the  Navy  Department  the  so-called 
pay  officers,  who  have  to  do  with  supplies  and  accounts,  are  likewise  to 
be  excepted.  In  all  these  cases,  however,  the  tradition  of  entrance  at 
an  early  age  into  the  lowest  rank  and  advancement  only  by  gradual  pro- 
motion through  the  grades  is  maintained,  so  that  for  the  present  purpose 
the  result  is  the  same. 


234  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

that  no  necessary  purpose  is  served  by  treating  these  functions 
as  a  part  of  the  business  of  the  military  estabhshment.  Those 
who  hold  this  view  would  create  a  distinct  civilian  organiza- 
tion for  those  functions  and  thus  solve  at  one  stroke  the  per- 
sonnel problem  here  under  discussion,  though,  needless  to  say, 
the  solution  of  this  problem  is  the  least  of  the  advantages 
which  these  advocates  urge  for  their  proposal.  Without  neces- 
sarily accepting  this  radical  view,  it  seems  clear  that  certain 
at  least  of  the  functions  now  performed  by  the  military  estab- 
lishment could  properly  and  profitably  be  placed  upon  a  civilian 
basis. 

Civilian  Engineers:  War  Department. — Particularly  would 
this  seem  to  be  the  case  with  the  civilian  engineering 
work  now  carried  on  under  the  direction  of  the  Chief  of  En- 
gineers of  the  army,  a  field  in  which  the  personnel  question 
here  involved  presents  itself  with  especial  force.  These  engi- 
neering operations,  which  as  is  well  known  have  to  do  princi- 
pally with  river  and  harbor  works  (though  embracing  also  the 
work  of  coast  fortifications),  are  conducted  upon  a  district 
basis,  the  country  being  divided  for  that  purpose  into  50 
districts.  The  chief  officers  of  each  district  organization  are 
army  engineers,  and  it  was  long  the  tradition  that  no  civilian 
member  of  the  force  could  ever  rise  to  the  position  of  engineer 
in  charge  of  a  particular  operation  or  work ;  but  this  tradition 
was  greatly  weakened  during  the  war  owing  to  the  demand  for 
the  services  of  the  army  engineers  in  active  military  duty.  It 
is  needless  to  point  out  that  the  best  civilian  engineers  will  not 
enter  or  remain  in  a  service  in  which  the  door  of  promotion 
is  closed  so  early  and  so  absolutely.  Numerous  proposals  have 
been  made,  running  back  into  the  eighties,  and  one  is  pending 
in  Congress  as  these  lines  are  written,  for  relieving  the  army 
engineers  of  responsibility  for  this  purely  civilian  engineering 
work  by  the  creation  of  a  department  of  public  works  or  some 
similiar  civilian  agency.  With  the  more  general  arguments  in 
favor  of  such  a  course  the  present  volume  is  not  concerned,  but 
its  advantages  from  the  standpoint  of  personnel  administration 
are  obvious.     These  proposals,  it  should  be  noted,  do  not  of 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  235 

necessity  imply  that  the  employment  of  army  engineers  for 
this  civilian  engineering  work  of  the  government  is  to  be  dis- 
continued. They  mean  simply  that  the  work  would  be  upon 
a  civilian  basis,  and  that  army  engineers  when  employed  in  that 
work,  while  remaining  members  of  the  military  establishment, 
would  be  regarded  as  on  detail  to  the  civili:m  department 
and  as  having  there  only  civilian  status. 

Even  if  it  be  assumed,  however,  that  the  responsibility  for 
civilian  engineering  work  should  remain  with  the  army  engi- 
neers, and  that  it  will  always  be  necessary  to  operate  certain  of 
the  staf¥  functions  upon  a  military  rather  than  a  civilian  basis, 
the  alternative  presents  itself  of  modifying  the  present  system 
of  selection  of  officers  to  the  extent  of  permitting  the  commis- 
sioning in  appropriate  rank  of  civilians  who  by  long  service 
in  these  staff  branches  of  the  military  and  naval  establishments 
have  equipped  themselves  for  administrative  responsibility. 
Needless  to  say,  this  method  was  resorted  to  on  a  large  scale 
during  the  war,  and  no  small  number  of  officers  thus  commis- 
sioned have  been  retained  as  part  of  the  permanent  establish- 
ment. The  method  should  now  be  made  a  normal,  instead  of 
merely  an  emergency,  one.  Its  adoption  will  require,  of  course, 
a  break  with  the  old  tradition  that  any  army  officer  must  be 
regarded  as  qualified  and  available  for  any  kind  of  administra- 
tive duty ;  but  this  tradition  has  always  been  an  absurdity  from 
the  standpoint  of  personnel  administration,  and  has  unquestion- 
ably resulted  in  enormous  waste  and  inefficiency  in  the  mili- 
tary establishment  itself.  There  is  no  reason  why  the  officers' 
corps  of  the  army  should  not  be  recruited  and  maintained, 
at  least  in  part,  so  far  as  the  staff  positions  are  concerned,  upon 
the  theory  that  obtains  in  every  other  type  of  organization, 
namely,  that  the  best  results  are  secured  through  the  develop- 
ment of  specialists  and  their  constant  retention  in  the  work  in 
which  they  have  specialized.^ 

*  Incidentally  it  may  be  pointed  out  that  the  traditions  of  the  Army 
and  the  Navy  have  differed  widely  in  this  respect  at  certain  points.  Par- 
ticularly has  this  been  so  in  connection  with  the  officers  concerned  with 
supplies  (other  than  ordnance  and  cognate  material)  and  accounts.  In 
the  Navy  these  officers  have  been  recruited  as  a  separate  class,  have  not 
been  instructed  in  naval  science,  and  have  been  constantly  kept  at  work 


236  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Attitude  of  Civil  Service  Commission. — It  might  be  as- 
sumed that,  in  a  matter  of  such  vital  and  fundamental  im- 
portance, the  Civil  Service  Commission,  by  securing  the  pro- 
mulgation of  appropriate  rules  by  the  President,  would  have 
remedied  this  major  omission  of  the  civil  service  law.  But 
such  is  not  the  case.  The  civil  service  rules  are  equally  silent 
upon  the  point.  The  Civil  Service  Commission  from  the  be- 
ginning has  taken  the  position,  wholly  indefensible  from  the 
standpoint  of  the  interests  of  the  personnel  system  as  a  whole, 
that  the  decision  to  resort  to  general  competition  for  the  fill- 
ing of  a  position  lies  wholly  in  the  hands  of  the  appointing 
officer. 

The  failure  of  the  Commission  to  take  any  interest  in  this 
matter  as  one  concerning  the  personnel  system  generally  is  all 
the  more  remarkable  in  view  of  the  position  which  it  has  as- 
sumed with  respect  to  transfers  from  one  department  or  estab- 
lishment to  another.  By  the  civil  service  rules  (Rule  X,  i) 
no  transfer  may  be  made  to  any  position  in  the  competitive 
service  "above  the  lowest  class  in  any  grade"  ^  unless  the 
appointing  officer  certifies  that  the  position  cannot  be  filled 
adequately  by  promotion.  The  reason  for  this  rule  was  stated 
by  the  Commission  at  the  time  of  its  promulgation  to  be  that 
"injustice  is  done  when  a  person  is  brought  into  a  department 
over  the  heads  of  those  deserving  promotion."  ^  It  need  hardly 
be  emphasized  that  the  injustice  is  far  greater  when  the  per- 
son so  brought  in  comes,  not   from  another  branch  of  the 

along  their  chosen  line.  In  the  Army,  pursuant  to  statutory  requirements, 
the  Quartermaster's  Corps,  as  the  officers  of  this  class  have  been  termed, 
has  been  recruited  by  a  system  of  four-year  details  of  regular  officers  of 
the  line.  It  is  at  least  an  interesting  speculation  whether  the  admitted  su- 
periority of  the  administration  of  the  naval  establishment  in  the  matter 
of  supplies  during  the  war  was  not  in  a  measure  attributable  to  the  supe- 
riority of  its  personnel  theory  in  this  field. 

*  The  terms  "class"  and  "grade"  are  used  in  this  rule  in  senses  which 
seem  precisely  contrary  to  their  ordinary  uses,  and  to  their  use  in  this 
volume.  The  civil  service  rules  (as  well  as  the  law  itself)  suffer  in 
clearness  at  not  a  few  points  because  of  the  lack  of  any  standard  nomen- 
clature in  personnel  matters.  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  the  reclassification 
of  the  employees  in  the  District  of  Columbia  now  under  consideration 
will  begin  an  improvement  in  this  respect. 

'  Twenty-first  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1904),  p.  15. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  237 

service — where  the  excellence  of  his  work,  the  length  of  his 
service,  or  the  absence  of  opportunity  for  further  advancement 
there  may  make  him  even  more  deserving  of  consideration  from 
the  service  than  those  over  whose  heads  he  is  brought  in — but 
from  outside  the  service.  It  would  seem  then  that  the  very 
least  the  Commission  could  do  in  consistency  would  be  to  rec- 
ommend to  the  President  a  rule  providing  that  no  position 
should  be  thrown  open  to  general  competition  unless  the  ap- 
pointing officer  certifies  that  the  position  cannot  be  filled  ade- 
quately by  promotion. 

But  undoubtedly  it  should  go  much  further.  Especially 
since  selection  by  open  competition  is  peculiarly  the  Commis- 
sion's own  province,  and  it  may  be  expected  to  have  expert 
knowledge  of  the  results  likely  to  follow  from  the  use  of  that 
method  in  any  case,  the  Commission,  under  the  rule,  should 
reserve  to  itself  the  right  to  say  finally  whether  open  competi- 
tion should  be  resorted  to,  or  selection  from  within  insisted 
upon.  Such  a  rule  is  already  found  in  several  states  and 
municipal  jurisdictions,  and  is  believed  to  have  worked  well. 
Were  such  a  policy  adopted  and  consistently  enforced  by  the 
Civil  Service  Commission  or  other  central  personnel  authority, 
it  might  shortly  develop  the  highest  value  in  an  altogether  dif- 
ferent direction — that  of  facilitating  the  elimination  of  politics 
from  selection.  Were  the  President,  without  changing  the 
classification  of  excepted  positions,  to  extend  the  proposed  rule 
to  them  (including  positions  excepted  by  statute  as  well  as  by 
the  rules)  the  result  would  be  forthwith  to  establish  the  merit 
tradition  for  those  positions.  If  the  appointing  officer  could 
secure  the  consent  of  the  Commission  to  fill  the  excepted  posi- 
tion from  outside  the  service,  he  would  still  be  wholly  un- 
trammeled,  of  course,  in  his  choice,  as  now;  but  the  mere  fact 
that  he  had  been  able  to  secure  the  right  to  appoint  in  this  way 
only  on  the  strength  of  a  representation  that  the  interests  of 
the  service  demanded  it  would  be  a  powerful  moral  influence 
making  for  a  reasonably  meritorious  selection.  If,  on  the 
other  hand,  the  Commission  declined  to  permit  selection  from 
without,  or  the  appointing  officer  failed  to  request  it,  the  person 


238  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

selected  from  within  the  service  would  promptly  come  to  enjoy 
substantially  a  competitive  status,  whatever  his  legal  status. 

The  policy  contended  for  might  even  be  applied,  with 
modifications,  to  presidential  positions.  The  Civil  Service 
Commission,  of  course,  could  not  control  the  discretion  of  the 
President  as  to  the  method  of  selection  to  be  employed  by  him 
for  these  offices,  but  he  could  require  the  Commission,  perhaps 
acting  in  consultation  with  the  head  of  the  department,  to 
recommend  to  him  the  method  to  be  employed.  The  recom- 
mendation of  the  Commission  unquestionably  would  shortly  ac- 
quire a  strong  moral  force. 

It  is  not  intended  in  the  foregoing  to  propose  that  the 
Commission  should  intervene  in  this  way  in  every  individual 
case  in  the  personnel  system.  In  most  services  and  at  cer- 
tain points  in  every  service,  it  is  entirely  feasible  to  determine 
upon  the  basis  of  experience  a  general  policy  of  either  restric- 
tion of  selection  to  those  within  or  of  resort  to  general  compe- 
tition, and  no  participation  of  any  central  personnel  authority 
is  necessary  in  these  cases  when  the  general  policy  defined  is 
observed.  In  this  area,  only  the  departures  from  the  general 
policy  require  approval  or  check  by  the  central  personnel 
authority.  At  other  points,  however,  owing  to  the  relative 
infrequency  of  vacancies  and  the  relatively  small  number  of 
those  within  the  service  from  among  whom  selection  is  possi- 
ble, it  would  be  unwise  to  attempt  to  define  in  advance  any 
general  policy.  Here  the  best  results  will  be  obtained  if  each 
vacancy  as  it  arises  is  made  the  occasion  for  a  separate  de- 
cision as  to  the  method  by  which  it  shall  be  filled ;  and  it  is  in 
these  cases  that  the  responsibility  of  the  central  personnel  au- 
thority enters.  In  some  cases  doubtless  only  by  an  examina- 
tion of  the  available  material  for  promotion  will  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  be  able  to  satisfy  itself  that  the  proposal 
of  the  appointing  officer  that  general  competition  be  resorted 
to  is  justified;  and  if  the  result  of  such  examination  is  adverse 
to  the  contention  of  the  appointing  officer,  it  has  had  the  value 
of  making  certain  that  whatever  person  the  appointing  officer 
does  appoint  is  sufficiently  qualified.     In  other  cases,  without 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT   ^       239 

formal  examination,  a  mere  appraisal  of  the  available  material 
within  the  service,  based  upon  their  service  history  and  past 
performance,  will  be  sufficient  to  enable  the  central  authority 
to  decide  if  resort  should  be  had  to  open  competition. 
Attitude  of  Reclassification  Commission. — The  recom- 
mendation of  the  Reclassification  Commission  on  this  head 
would  seem  to  go  even  further  than  is  here  proposed.  The 
Commission  recommends  "that  when  vacancies  in  the  higher 
classes  are  not  filled  by  transfer  or  reinstatement,  they  be  filled 
by  promotion  of  properly  qualified  employees  as  determined  by 
competitive  civil  service  examination,  and  that  ordinarily  open 
competitive  examinations  for  the  filling  of  such  vacancies  be 
held  only  when  three  such  eligibles  cannot  be  secured  from 
those  already  in  the  service."  ^ 

In  the  absence  of  any  central  requirement  of  the  character 
here  contended  for,  it  might  be  anticipated  that  the  principle 
of  selection  from  within  had  received  but  scant  observance  in 
those  branches  of  the  classified  service  in  which  it  is  applicable. 
In  point  of  fact,  however,  despite  the  absence  of  any  statutory 
or  other  central  requirement,  and  despite,  too,  the  absence  of 
any  definite  or  clearly  expressed  policy,  in  the  departments 
themselves,  the  principle  of  restricting  selection  to  those  within 
the  service  has  been  very  generally  followed  in  the  classified 
competitive  service.^  This  existing  tendency  to  select  from 
within,  however,  has  been  restricted  generally  to  selecting 
from  among  the  employees  of  the  organization  unit  in  which 
the  vacancy  occurs  or  from  the  employees  of  adjacent  organiza- 
tions. The  precise  limits  of  the  area  of  selection  form  the 
subject  of  a  subsequent  section. 

It  need  hardly  be  added  that  this  characteristic  of  the  ex- 
isting situation  is  subject  to  many,  and  in  some  cases  important, 
exceptions.  Since  existing  practice  has  been  determined  wholly 
by  departmental  action,  usually  of  an  informal  kind,  it  has 
varied  not  a  little  from  service  to  service  and  from  time  to 

^  Report  of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  Part  I,  p.  124. 

*As  already  indicated  in  a  preceding  chapter,  the  exception  of  a  posi- 
tion from  competition,  whether  by  rule  or  by  statute,  has  generafly 
meant  that  it  will  be  filled  by  the  appointment  of  one  outside  the  service. 


240  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

time.  Moreover,  settled  traditions  may  l^e  discerned  in  any 
case,  of  course,  only  in  those  services  which  are  well  established. 
Recent  years  have  witnessed  the  creation  of  a  number  of  new 
services  and  organizations  in  the  government,  and  in  recruiting 
for  these  services  the  great  majority  of  positions  have  neces- 
sarily been  filled  from  outside  the  service.  There  thus  exists 
in  these  services  as  yet  no  well  defined  tradition  on  this  head; 
nor  in  the  case  of  any  of  these  services  that  has  come  to  at- 
tention has  the  problem  been  grappled  with  in  advance  and  a 
policy  formulated  and  promulgated. 

Central  Control  of  Selection  by  Promotion  from  Within. — 
In  view  of  the  prevalence  of  the  practice  of  recruitment  from 
within  by  a  process  of  promotion,  the  question  of  the  means 
employed  for  the  selection  of  employees  to  be  advanced  is  one 
of  importance.  The  framers  of  the  civil  service  act  unques- 
tionably intended  that  there  should  be  some  control  in  respect 
to  this  matter.  The  act  thus  lays  down  the  basic  principle  that 
"no  person  shall  ...  be  promoted  .  .  .  until  he  has  passed 
an  examination  or  is  shown  to  be  specially  exempted  from  such 
examination  in  conformity  herewith."  (Sec.  7.)  ^  Comment- 
ing on  this  provision  the  Civil  Service  Commission  in  1899 
pointed  out  that  "No  classified  clerk  or  employee  who  is  not 
specially  exempted  in  conformity  with  the  provisions  of  the  act 
can  legally  be  promoted  without  examination.  In  other  words, 
exemption  from  examination  for  promotion  is  not  intended  to 
be  made  general.  The  intention  of  the  law  is  that  to  be  eligible 
for  promotion  to  any  class  or  place  the  applicant  must  have 
shown  fitness  on  examination  appropriate  for  the  class  or 
place."  2 

The  Commission  went  on  to  point  out,  however,  that 
despite  the  manifest  intention  of  the  act,  up  to  that  time  it  had 
not  been  found  feasible  to  give  it  practical  effect ;  ^  and  the 

*  It  will  be  observed  that  there  is  no  requirement  that  the  "examina- 
tion" provided  for  be  competitive. 

"  Sixteenth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1899),  p.  102. 

^In  its  first  report,  in  1884,  the  Commission  said  that  the  need  of 
caution  in  making  great  changes  which  a  new  system  involved,  and  the 
fact  that  the  Commission  had  too  much  work  at  the  outset,  were  per- 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  241 

same  or  other  difficulties  appear  to  have  persisted  down  to  the 
present  time.^ 

haps  in  themselves  adequate  reasons  for  not  dealing  at  once  with  the 
difficult  subject  of  promotions.  In  the  second  report  it  is  stated  ^hat 
the  observations  of  another  year  had  shown  more  conclusively  the  need 
of  interposing  some  examination  or  test,  both  to  secure  to  the  most 
meritorious  their  proper  claims  to  advancement  as  opportunities  occur, 
and  also  to  shut  out  the  solicitations  and  intluence  of  outside  parties  from 
securing  or  attempting  to  secure  promotions  without  merit.  It  added 
that  it  had  become  obvious  that  notwithstanding  the  difficulty  of  devising 
a  system  which  should  give  merit  its  just  reward,  and  should  yet  leave 
the  appointing  officer  his  full  right  and  responsibility  for  his  office,  some 
rules  upon  the  subject  of  promotion  by  examination  ought  to  be  promul- 
gated at  the  earliest  day  practicable.  In  its  third  report  the  Commission 
again  stated  the  need  of  promotion  rules  and  the  reasons  for  failure  to 
provide  such  rules. 

^  For  the  first  thirteen  years  of  the  operation  of  the  act,  even  the 
requirement  of  the  act  that  there  should  be  examination  for  promotion 
in  all  cases  not  specifically  exempted  was  not  observed.  By  the  rules 
adopted  May  6,  i8q6  (Rule  XI,  Clause  4),  however,  the  Commission 
was  instructed  to  promulgate  regulations  governing  promotion,  the  rule 
declaring  that  "Regulations  to  govern  promotions  shall  be  formulated  by 
the  Commission  after  consultation  with  the  heads  of  the  several  depart- 
ments, bureaus,  or  offices.  It  shall  be  the  duty  of  the  head  of  each  de- 
partment, bureau,  or  office,  when  such  regulations  have  been  formulated, 
to  promulgate  the  same,  and  any  amendments  or  revocations  thereof 
shall  be  approved  by  the  Commission  before  going  into  effect." 

The  rule,  however,  fixed  no  time  limit  within  which  such  regulations 
were  to  be  formulated.  It  provided  that  "Until  the  regulations  here  au- 
thorized have  been  approved  for  any  department,  bureau,  or  office  in 
which  promotion  regulations  approved  by  the  Commission  are  not  in  force 
promotions  therein  may  be  made  from  one  class  to  another  class  which 
is  in  the  same  grade,  and  from  one  grade  to  another  grade,  upon  any 
test  of  fitness,  not  disapproved  by  the  Commission,  which  may  be  de- 
termined upon  by  the  promoting  officer,"  thus  leaving  the  matter  vir- 
tually in  the  same  situation  as  it  had  been  in  previously.  But  several 
provisos  were  annexed  to  this  rule,  the  observance  of  which  would  have 
meant  a  very  considerable  participation  of  the  Commission  in  the  process 
of  promotion.     They  were  as  follows : 

"Provided,  That  no  promotion  of  a  person  shall  be  made,  except 
upon  examination  provided  by  the  Commission,  from  one  class  to  an- 
other class,  or  from  one  grade  to  another  grade,  if  for  original  entrance 
to  said  class  or  grade  to  which  promotion  is  proposed  there  is  required 
by  these  rules  an  examination  involving  essential  tests  different  from  or 
higher  than  those  involved  in  the  examination  required  for  original  en- 
trance to  the  class  or  grade  from  which  promotion  is  proposed :  And 
provided  further.  That  no  promotion  of  a  person  shall  be  made,  except 
upon  examination  provided  by  the  Commission,  to  a  position  in  which,  in 
the  judgment  of  the  Commission,  there  is  not  required  the  performance 
of  the  same  class  of  work  or  the  practice  of  the  same  mechanical  trade 
which  is  required  to  be  performed  or  practiced  in  the  position  from  which 
promotion  is  proposed ;  but  a  person  employed  in  any  grade  shall  not, 
because  of  such  employment,  be  barred  from  the  open  competitive  ex- 
amination provided  for  original  entrance  to  any  other  grade;  And  pro- 
vided further,  That  no  promotion  of  a  person  shall  be  made  to  a  class 
or  grade  from  original  entrance  to  which  such  person  is  barred  by  the 
age  limitations  prescribed  therefor  or  by  the  provisions  regulating  ap- 
portionment." 

No   procedure  was   provided,   however,    for  the   bringing  to   the   at- 


242  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Under  the  revision  of  the  rules  made  in  1903,  and  still 
in  force,  provision  is  made  for  the  promulgation  of  regula- 
tions governing  promotion.  Such  regulations  have  been  made, 
however,  only  for  a  small  and  irregular  area  of  the  service,^ 
so  that  over  almost  the  whole  of  the  service,  practice  is  gov- 
erned only  by  the  provisions  of  the  rules,  which  the  rules 
themselves  (Rule  XI,  2)  provide  are  to  be  applied  "until 
regulations  to  govern  promotions  are  made." 

These  provisions,  so  far  as  they  bear  on  the  subject  under 
discussion,  are  as  follows : 

.  .  .  Promotions  may  be  made  upon  any  test  of  fitness 
not  disapproved  by  the  Commission,  which  may  be  determined 

tention  of  the  Commission  cases  in  which  promotion  might  be  made  in 
violation  of  these  provisos  and,  in  point  of  fact,  they  never  had  much  effect. 
Under  the  provision  authorizing  the  promulgation  of  regulations  by 
the  Commission  in  consultation  with  the  heads  of  departments  regula- 
tions were  provided  from  time  to  time  for  various  classes  of  employees. 
The  regulations  generally  provided  merely  that  promotions  should  be 
made  upon  such  tests  of  fitness  as  the  head  of  the  department,  with  the 
approval  of  the  Commission,  might  prescribe,  and  under  these  regula- 
tions, a  system  of  nominal  examinations,  purely  non-competitive  in  char- 
acter, was  for  some  time  applied  in  several  of  the  departments  and  serv- 
ices. 

^  The  portions  of  the  classified  service  to  which  the  Commission  has 
actually  promulgated  promotion  regulations  as  contemplated  by  the  rules 
are : 

Treasury  Department 
Mint  and  Assay  Service 
Customs  Service 
War  Department 
Ordnance  Department  at  Large 
Engineer  Department  at  Large 
Quartermaster  Corps 
Military   Academy 
Navy  Department 

Navy  Yard  Service 
Interior  Department 
Reclamation   Service 

Indian   Irrigation  and   Allotment   Service 
St.  Elizabeth's  Hospital 
Department  of  Commerce 
Lighthouse  Service 

Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  (in  relation  to  persons  employed  on 
vessels) 
It  need  hardly  be  pointed  out  how  utterly  lacking  in  reason  or  con- 
sistency is  the  area  of  application  of  promotion  regulations  by  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  as  thus  outlined.  In  point  of  fact,  the  initiative  in 
promulgating  such  regulations  would  seem  in  most  cases  to  have  come 
from  the  departments  or  services  concerned  rather  than  the  Commission. 
It  hardly  can  be  said  that  the  action  of  the  Commission  in  these  areas 
of  the  service  has  been  of  much  more  significance  than  its  complete  in- 
action over  the  remainder  of  the  service. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  243 

upon  by  the  promoting  officer,  subject  to  the  following  limi- 
tations : 

(b)  In  case  of  promotion  to  a  position  for  which  the  en- 
trance tests  are  different  the  person  to  be  promoted  must  first 
pass  an  appropriate  examination  before  the  Commission.^ 

Substantially  the  same  provisions  are  found  in  the  several 
departmental  promotion  regulations  which  have  been  promul- 
gated in  accordance  with  the  rule. 

The  provision  requiring  promotion  to  be  made  "upon  any 
test  of  fitness  not  disapproved  by  the  Commission  which  may 
be  determined  by  the  promoting  officer"  is  a  dead  letter,  as 
promoting  officers  do  not  advise  the  Commission  of  the  nature 
of  the  tests,  if  any,  which  they  employ  in  making  selection  for 
promotion,  and  the  Commission  has  consequently  no  basis  for 
disapproving  such  tests.  As  pointed  out  in  the  following  chap- 
ter, no  tests  are  applied  over  the  greater  part  of  the  service. 

The  essential  provision  is  thus  the  one  requiring  that  in 
case  of  promotion  to  a  position  to  which  the  entrance  tests 
are  different  from  those  fixed  for  the  position  which  the  per- 
son to  be  promoted  then  occupies,  he  must  first  pass  an  ap- 
propriate examination  before  the  Commission.-  This  limita- 
tion, it  will  be  observed,  applies  only  "in  case  of  a  promotion 
to  a  position  for  which  the  entrance  tests  are  different."  The 
practical  effect  of  this  rule  is  to  require  examination  by  the 
Commission  only  where  the  proposed  promotion  is  out  of  the 
ordinary  direct  line.    As  long  as  the  promotion  is  in  the  direct 

*  But  Section  (c)  provides  that  "Any  employee  in  the  classified  In- 
dian Service  may,  with  the  approval  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior,  be 
promoted  without  examination  to  the  position  of  superintendent  of  an 
Indian  school,  upon  a  statement  of  the  Commissioner  of  Indian  Affairs 
that  the  employee  possesses  the  requisite  business  and  executive  quali- 
fications to  fill  the  position,  and  the  Commission  will  on  such  statement 
issue  the  necessary  certificate." 

'  Even  this  requirement,  it  should  be  noted,  is  not  absolute,  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  having  been  authorized  in  1907  "in  its  discretion, 
looking  to  the  good  of  the  service  only,  to  waive  requirements  for  exam- 
ination and  to  substitute  for  such  examinations  so  waived  such  other 
tests  of  fitness  and  capacity  as  the  Commission  may  decide."  Executive 
Order,  November  22,  1907.  This  order,  however,  is  seldom  invoked. 
No  statistics  as  to  its  use  are  currently  compiled;  but  it  is  stated  that 
it  was  employed  only  four  times  during  1919  (Memorandum  of  the  Sec- 
retary of  the  Commission  to  the  Institute  for  Government  Research). 


244  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

line  no  intervention  by  the  Commission  is  required  by  the  rule, 
no  matter  how  much  higher  may  be  requirements  which  would 
be  set  on  entrance  examination,  were  one  held,  for  the  posi- 
tion to  which  transfer  is  proposed  than  for  the  position  already 
occupied  by  the  candidate  for  promotion. 

With  respect  to  proposed  promotions  from  one  position 
to  another  in  the  natural  line  of  advancement,  however  wide 
the  gap  between  the  lower  and  the  higher  position,  or  be- 
tween the  position  in  which  the  employee  promoted  originally 
entered  the  service  and  that  to  which  he  is  now  promoted,  pro- 
motion may  be  made  by  the  administrative  officer  wholly  with- 
out control  or  supervision  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission.^ 
Whether  this  condition  is  a  desirable  one  is  a  question  on  which 
there  will  be  a  diversity  of  opinion.  Some  contend  that  a 
central  control  or  supervision  is  in  no  case  necessary — that  the 
interest  of  the  administrator  in  securing  efficient  service  is  suf- 
ficent  to  insure  that  recruitment  will  be  resorted  to  where 
selection  from  within  will  not  yield  suitable  appointees.  At 
the  other  extreme  is  the  view  that  every  promotion  should  be 
subject  to  the  vise  of  the  central  personnel  authority  to  in- 
sure that  the  employee  promoted  is  w^orthy  of  promotion.- 

To  adopt  either  of  these  extreme  views  is  neither  necessary 

'The  civil  service  rules  (Rule  X,  8,  e)  provide  also  "that  where  the 
promotion  involves  a  transfer  from  one  branch  of  the  service  to  another 
the  Commission  shall  be  satisfied  that  the  person  proposed  for  such 
transfer  and  promotion  possesses  experience,  qualifications,  or  training 
which  are  required  for  the  proper  performance  of  the  duties  of  the 
position  to  which  transfer  is  proposed  and  which  render  necessary  in  the 
interests  of  the  service  the  filling  of  the  position  by  his  transfer,  rather 
than  by  an  original  appointment  or  promotion  in  tlie  manner  provided  by 
the  civil  service  act."  This  rule  is  so  infrequently  applied,  however,  that 
its  importance  is  negligible. 

'  This  is  the  view  in  the  regulations  for  promotion  examination 
found  in  certain  jurisdictions,  in  which  examination  for  promotion  is 
required  to  be  held  by  the  central  personnel  authority  even  where  the 
number  of  employees  eligible  for  examination  is  no  more  than  the  num- 
ber, usually  three,  from  among  whom  the  appointing  ofiiccr  has,  under 
the  rules,  free  selection.  In  such  a  case  the  examination  can  serve  no 
purpose  other  than  to  bar  from  promotion  the  employee  who  fails  to 
pass  the  examination.  As  will  be  more  fully  set  forth  in  the  following 
chapter,  the  Reclassification  Commission  has  recommended  that  a  sys- 
tem of  competitive  promotion  examination  be  set  up  over  the  whole  of 
the  federal  service.  It  is  not  clear  from  the  Commission's  report  whether 
its  recommendation  contemplates  the  holding  of  examinations  even  under 
the  circumstances  just  cited. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  245 

nor  desirable.  Some  branches  of  the  service  have  such  a  wealth 
of  available  material  that  it  may  safely  be  assumed  by  the 
central  personnel  authority  that  a  fully  competent  employee 
can  be  found  for  any  post  which  becomes  vacant.  In  respect 
to  other  branches  no  such  assumption  can  be  made  safely,  be- 
cause of  the  small  number  of  eligible  employees,  or  the  wide 
gap  between  one  position  and  another,  in  difficulty  and  re- 
sponsibility. What  is  called  for,  therefore,  is  a  detailed  specifi- 
cation by  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  after  careful  study, 
of  the  particular  positions  to  which  promotion  may  be  made 
only  with  its  approval,  such  approval  to  be  given,  where  the 
Commission  deems  necessary,  only  after  examination  by  the 
Commission  of  the  person  proposed  for  promotion. 

Were  a  general  system  of  promotion  examinations  by  the 
Civil  Service  Commission  to  be  instituted,  as  recommended  by 
the  Reclassification  Commission,  such  examinations  while  in- 
tended primarily  as  a  means  of  selecting  from  among  all  the 
employees  eligible  for  promotion  the  one  best  qualified  for  the 
promotion,  would  incidentally  prevent  the  promotion  of  any 
employee  not  qualified  as  judged  by  the  Commission's  stand- 
ard. The  whole  question  here  under  discussion  is  closely 
bound  up,  of  course,  with  the  methods  employed  in  making 
selection  for  promotion,  which  form  the  subject  of  the  follow- 
ing chapter.  In  that  chapter  the  view  is  taken  that  generally 
speaking  the  most  practicable  method  of  determining  promo- 
tions in  the  federal  service  is  to  leave  the  determination  in 
the  hands  of  properly  constituted  administrative  boards,  in 
which  the  Civil  Service  Commission  would  have  ex-officio 
representation.  Such  representation  would  manifestly  furnish 
a  complete  and  effective  safeguard  over  the  whole  service 
against  the  promotion  of  the  unfit. 

Note  should  be  taken  here  of  a  statutory  provision  aimed 
to  prevent  the  promotion  of  the  unfit  which  has  never  been 
given  practical  effect.  In  19 12  Congress  authorized  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  to  install  in  the  departments  at  Washing- 
ton a  system  of  efificiency  records,  and  directed  among  other 
things  that  the  system  should  provide  for  a  standard  of  efiici- 


246  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

ency  failing  which  an  employee  would  be  ineligible  for  promo- 
tion. By  subsequent  enactment  the  responsibility  for  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  system  was  transferred  to  the  Bureau  of  Effici- 
ency. Because  of  inadequate  appropriations,  and  for  other 
reasons  not  here  material,  no  progress  worth  mentioning  to 
date  has  been  made  in  the  development  of  the  system  called 
for  by  the  statute.  It  is  believed,  however,  that  even  were  it 
fully  established  the  specific  provision  mentioned  would  be  of 
little  value.  Only  in  the  most  exceptional  cases,  if  even  then, 
would  an  administrative  officer  attempt  to  promote  an  employee 
who  had  displayed  so  little  capacity  in  the  performance  of  his 
present  duties  as  to  be  rated  below  a  normal  standard  of  effici- 
ency. 

In  discussing  any  phase  of  the  question  of  control  or  su- 
pervision of  promotions  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  it 
must  be  borne  in  mind  always  that  effective  control  or  super- 
vision is  out  of  the  question  unless  the  Commission  has  at  its 
disposal  adequate  means  for  ascertaining  what  the  duties  of  a 
given  position  actually  are.  Without  such  means,  and  their 
capable  utilization,  changes  in  duties  may  be  made  by  the  oper- 
ating departments  without  the  knowledge  of  the  Commission 
which  are  actually  promotions,  though  in  appearance  mere  re- 
assignments. 

Existing  Conditions:  Positions  Not  in  the  Natural  Line 
of  Promotion. — In  every  large  organization  and  indeed 
in  many  fairly  small  ones,  subordinate  positions  or  groups  of 
positions  are  encountered,  the  duties  of  which  do  not  tend  to 
fit  those  occupying  them  for  any  position  more  advanced  in 
responsibility  or  difficulty  or  in  the  value  of  the  work  per- 
formed. The  extent  to  which  such  positions  exist  in  large  scale 
enterprises  is  perhaps  not  fully  appreciated  by  those  who  have 
not  given  the  matter  specific  attention.  The  facile  assumption 
is  made  that  each  employment  leads  naturally  to  the  one  above. 

There  are  two  factors  which  may  cause  certain  positions  to 
become  "blind  alleys."  The  first  is  found  in  positions  which 
are  concerned  wholly  with  subsidiary  or  auxiliary  phases  of 
the  organization's  work  and  thus  do  not  give  to  those  occupying 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  247 

them  any  knowledge  or  experience  in  the  substantive  operations 
of  the  organization,  which  is,  of  course,  indispensable  to 
any  worth  while  advancement,  A  limited  field  of  advancement 
may,  and  usually  does  exist,  of  course,  within  the  particular 
branch  of  the  organization  devoted  to  such  auxiliary  or  in- 
stitutional activity;  but  this  field  is  virtually  negligible  when 
considered  in  comparison  with  that  presented  by  the  operating 
branches. 

The  other  factor  which  operates  to  give  certain  classes  of 
positions  their  "blind  alley"  character  is  that  of  education.  The 
advanced  positions  may  require  an  educational  equipment, 
whether  technical  or  general,  which  the  work  of  the  lower 
grades  in  no  wise  furnishes.  In  the  technical  branches  illustra- 
tions of  this  condition  abound.  A  mechanical  draftsman  in 
order  to  qualify  for  the  higher  grade  of  mechanical  engineer 
must  pursue  a  specialized  course  of  instruction  in  mechanical 
engineering  quite  distinct  from  and,  in  many  respects,  in  no 
wise  related  to,  the  duties  which  he  performs  as  mechanical 
draftsman;  the  mere  typist  who  aspires  to  become  a  stenog- 
rapher must  pursue  a  specialized  course  of  instruction  in 
stenography  and  perhaps  also  in  English;  and  the  like  is  true 
of  the  laboratory  assistant,  who  desires  to  become  a  physicist 
or  chemist  or  bacteriologist,  or  of  the  clerk  employed  in  a 
branch  of  the  government  in  which  legal  services  are  required 
who  aspires  to  become  a  lawyer. 

Nor  is  the  situation  confined  to  the  technical  branches  of 
education;  it  presents  itself  also,  though  in  a  more  debatable 
way,  in  respect  to  general  educational  equipment.  This  phase 
of  the  problem  presents  itself  particularly  in  connection  with 
the  filling  of  the  higher  non-technical  administrative  posts,  but 
it  is  found  also  in  the  case  of  not  a  few  technical  positions 
of  the  higher  grades.  The  service  may  furnish  ample  oppor- 
tunity for  the  acquisition  of  the  requisite  technical  informa- 
tion by  the  personnel  in  the  lower  grades;  but  it  may  be  felt 
that  the  higher  position  requires  in  addition  a  background  of 
general  education  and  culture  not  likely  to  be  possessed  by  the 
subordinate  personnel.     This  particular  phase  of  the  problem. 


248  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

however,  will  receive  fuller  consideration  in  a  subsequent  sec- 
tion. 

These  two  factors  cause  the  service  to  become  stratified, 
with  progress  from  one  stratum  to  the  next  virtually  impossi- 
ble. That  this  condition,  both  from  the  social  standpoint  and 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  morale  of  the  service,  is  undesirable 
is  too  obvious  to  require  more  than  mere  mention.  Some 
hold,  however,  that  this  stratification,  with  its  blind  alley- 
positions  at  the  end  of  the  lowest  strata,  must  be  accepted  as 
inherent  in  the  modern  large-scale  organization,  and  that  it  is 
futile  for  the  framer  of  personnel  policies  to  attempt  to  run 
counter  to  the  powerful  drift  of  economic  processes.  What- 
ever the  validity  of  this  view,  social  policy  demands  for  the 
public  service,  at  least,  that  every  effort  be  made  to  escape 
from  this  condition  or  to  moderate  it  so  far  as  can  be  done 
without  undue  injury  to  the  service  itself.  This  can  be  done 
on  the  one  hand  by  enlarging  the  opportunity  for  each  sub- 
ordinate employee  to  acquire  a  well  rounded  familiarity  with 
the  operations  of  the  organization  as  a  whole;  and,  on  the 
other,  by  assisting  those  in  the  lower  grades  to  obtain  the 
educational  equipment  that  is  required  for  the  work  of  the 
higher. 

This  matter  is  one  which  hitherto  has  received  but  little 
attention  in  most  branches  of  the  federal  service.  The  admin- 
istrative officers  concerned  have  failed  apparently  to  appreciate 
its  importance,  though  it  has  long  been  a  familiar  theme  of 
discussion  among  industrial  personnel  managers  and  among 
those  interested  in  personnel  generally.  The  limited  develop- 
ment which  this  feature  has  obtained  in  the  federal  service  is 
strongly  suggestive  of  the  need  already  pointed  out  for  the 
provision  in  each  department  and  in  each  major  organization 
unit  of  an  officer  specifically  charged  with  responsibility  for  the 
development  of  personnel  policies. 

To  attempt  to  consider  specifically  all  the  numerous  points 
in  the  federal  service  at  which  the  question  of  granting  pref- 
erence to  those  in  the  service  for  positions  not  in  the  natural 
line  of  promotion  may  arise,  would  be  impracticable,  and  of 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  249 

doubtful  value,  but  a  few  of  the  points  at  which  it  presents 
itself  in  an  important  way  may  profitably  be  mentioned. 

Sub-Clerical  Positions. — In  the  clerical  service,  a  question 
arises  at  the  very  lowest  level  of  that  service  in  respect  to  pro- 
motion from  the  so-called  sub-clerical  positions — positions  such 
as  messenger,  storekeeper,  watchman,  etc. — to  that  of  clerk. 
The  number  of  clerks  required  in  the  lowest  grade  is  so 
great  in  proportion  to  the  number  of  sub-clerical  employees 
that  recruitment  from  outside  the  service  must  be  resorted  to 
in  any  case  for  this  grade,  but  the  question  is  whether  promo- 
tion from  the  sub-clerical  grade  to  the  lowest  clerical  grade 
should  be  permitted  in  any  case.  When  the  proposal  to  open 
the  clerical  service  to  promotion  from  the  sub-clerical  was  first 
made  in  1895,  it  was  rejected  by  President  Cleveland,  who 
aptly  declared: 

After  a  good  deal  of  consideration  I  cannot  make  myself 
believe  that  messengers,  etc.,  should  be  subject  to  the  promo- 
tions provided  for.  The  theory  of  the  amendment  may  not 
be  amiss,  but  I  am  confident  that  in  practice  we  should  have  in 
the  messenger,  etc.,  grade  persons  who  entered  it  for  the  pur- 
pose of  promotion,  and  who  would  be  looking  for  that  instead 
of  striving  to  perform  well  the  work  assigned.  Every  mes- 
senger and  every  watchman,  after  two  years'  service  and  ex- 
amination, backed  and  supported  by  Senators  and  Representa- 
tives, would  make  it  very  uncomfortable  for  the  head  of  his 
Department  until  he  obtained  the  increased  salary  he  coveted; 
and  in  the  meantime  he  would  make  a  very  poor  messenger 
and  watchman. 

I  am  certain  the  proposed  amendments  would  increase  the 
perplexities  of  the  executive  officers  of  the  Government  with- 
out any  compensation  in  the  way  of  better  public  service. 

In  the  following  year,  however,  he  was  persuaded  to  change 
his  mind,  and  a  rule  was  promulgated  permitting  such  pro- 
motion after  two  years'  service ;  promotion  to  be  made  by  com- 
petitive examination  within  each  department,  with  certification 
of  the  eligibles  in  the  order  of  their  grades  in  the  same  man- 
ner as  for  original  entrance  to  the  service.  This  procedure 
though  no  longer  appearing  in  the  rules,  is  incorporated  in 


250  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

the  departmental  promotion  regulations  above  referred  to  and 
is  still  in  force. 

Clerical  Posifioiis. — .Vlthough  the  rule  thus  requires  com- 
petitive examination,  the  great  number  of  vacancies  in  the 
clerical  service  in  proportion  to  the  number  of  sub-clerical 
competitors  makes  it  reasonably  certain  that  any  one  who 
passes  the  examination  will  receive  promotion  to  the  clerical 
grade,  so  that  the  examination  is  in  reality  merely  qualifying. 
The  number  of  persons  rejected  by  the  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion in  these  promotion  examinations  from  the  sub-clerical  to 
the  clerical  grade  is  proportionately  much  larger  than  in  any 
other  type  of  promotion  examinations,  yet  it  is  believed,  never- 
theless, that  many  sub-clerical  employees  succeed  in  passing 
the  examination  and  in  securing  promotion  who  would  be  al- 
together unlikely  to  pass  the  open  competitive  clerical  exami- 
nation with  ratings  sufficiently  high  to  secure  them  appointment 
under  normal  conditions  of  supply  and  demand.  If  this  be 
so,  the  present  practice  in  permitting  promotion  from  the  sub- 
clerical  to  the  clerical  grades  on  the  basis  of  what  amounts 
to  a  mere  qualifying  or  pass  examination  may  be  assumed  to 
result  in  the  infiltration  into  the  service  of  under-qualified 
persons,  at  first  into  the  lower  grades  and  hence,  ultimately, 
by  mere  seniority  or  the  absence  of  better  material,  perhaps 
into  an  administrative  post  of  no  little  responsibility.  The 
remedy  is  to  be  found  in  the  proposal  already  made,  that  the 
promotion  examinations  in  such  cases  involve  a  qualifying 
standard  very  considerably  above  that  required  for  qualifying 
in  the  open  competitive  examination  for  these  grades. 

Stenographic  Positions. — Stenographic  positions  present 
a  somewhat  similar  question.  They  usually  offer  more  rapid 
advancement  to  the  higher  salary  rates  than  do  the  clerical 
positions  of  the  lowest  grade,  although  the  ultimate  possibilities 
are  frequently  not  so  good,  and  consequently  in  most  large  per- 
sonnel systems  those  in  the  lowest  clerical  grade  seek  to  secure 
promotion  to  the  stenographic  positions.  The  same  is  true  of 
typists,  adding  machine  operators,  and  other  persons  perform- 
ing clerical  work  of  a  mechanical  nature.    In  the  federal  service 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  251 

this  type  of  promotion  has  never  been  permitted,  but  em- 
ployees have  been  required  to  compete  in  the  regular  open  ex- 
aminations. If  assurance  can  be  had  that  the  high  examination 
standards  contended  for  will  actually  be  applied,  it  would  seem 
desirable  on  the  general  principle  of  enlarging  the  opportu- 
nities for  promotion  within  the  service  that  promotion  of  this 
kind  should  be  permitted  in  the  federal  service. 

Statistical  Accounting  and  Legal  Positions. — In  the  filling 
of  posts  in  those  technical  services  which  lie  close  to  the  cleri- 
cal service — the  statistical,  the  accounting,  and  the  legal  services 
— the  practice  in  the  federal  service  has  varied  widely.  In  a 
number  of  cases  these  positions  have  been  filled  by  the  promo- 
tion of  persons  from  the  clerical  service.  In  others,  recruit- 
ment from  without  the  service  has  been  resorted  to.  In  the 
legal  service,  recruitment  has  unquestionably  been  resorted  to 
far  more  widely  than  promotion.  In  the  case  of  the  other 
two  classes  of  service  a  general  statement  would  be  very  diffi- 
cult to  make. 

Had  the  choice  of  one  of  the  other  of  these  methods  of 
selection  been  based,  in  every  case,  upon  a  reasoned  policy  and 
supported  by  an  actual  appraisal  of  the  material  available,  the 
absence  of  any  uniformity  would  be  no  occasion  for  unfavor- 
able comment.  It  is  believed,  however,  that  examination  would 
disclose  that  the  varying  decisions  in  this  matter,  varying  not 
only  from  service  to  service  but  from  time  to  time  within  the 
same  service,  have  been  based  for  the  most  part  on  no  con- 
sistent policy  or  practice,  but  have  been  largely  the  expression 
of  the  varying  or  shifting  views  of  the  several  administrative 
officers  concerned. 

The  service  actually  secured  in  this  field  through  selection 
from  within  is  believed  to  have  been  poorer,  on  the  whole, 
than  would  have  been  secured  by  general  competition.  Ex- 
ceptions to  this  statement  are  numerous,  and  there  is  no  reason 
why  such  a  statement  should  be  true  at  all  if  proper  safeguards 
and  methods  are  employed.  Until  they  are  applied,  the  service 
will  continue  to  fill  positions  of  the  character  in  question  in 
many  cases  by  the  promotion  of  persons  originally  recruited  as 


252  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

clerks  who  do  not  possess  even  approximately  the  same  de- 
gree of  capacity  as  could  be  obtained  by  general  competition 
or  indeed  by  drawing  upon  the  available  material  within  the 
sen'ice  as  a  whole  rather  than  merely  upon  that  immediately 
adjacent  to  the  particular  vacancy  to  be  filled. 

Other  Technical  Positions. — The  question  of  filling  all 
technical  positions,  for  which  an  extensive  preparation  is 
ordinarily  required,  from  the  ranks  of  lower  technical  posi- 
tions not  involving  such  preparation,  a  question  illustrated  by 
the  case  of  the  mechanical  draftsman  who  seeks  promotion 
to  the  position  of  mechanical  engineer  of  the  lowest  grade,  is 
similar  to  that  above  referred  to  in  connection  with  stenographic 
positions  in  the  clerical  service,  though,  of  course,  the  levels 
of  the  service  involved  are  considerably  higher.  From  the 
standpoint  of  policy  the  matter  is  almost  wholly  one  of  the 
severity  of  the  qualifying  examination.  In  the  federal  service 
it  has  not  been  common  to  permit  promotions  of  this  kind, 
recourse  being  usually  had  to  general  competition.  Occa- 
sionally, however,  promotions  of  this  character  have  been  per- 
mitted. Given  a  sufficiently  high  standard  of  qualifying  ex- 
aminations, they  should  be  encouraged.  Given  the  standard 
of  examination  which  is  believed  to  obtain  at  the  present  time, 
such  promotions  will,  and  to  the  extent  that  they  are  employed 
they  doubtless  do,  result  in  a  somewhat  inferior  class  of  service 
than  would  be  obtained  through  the  medium  of  general  com- 
petition. 

Selection  from  Within  as  Affected  by  Educational  Stand- 
ards at  Entrance. — A  phase  of  the  problem  of  selection 
from  within,  which  though  of  primary  significance  has  been 
mentioned  thus  far  only  in  passing,  is  the  question  of  the  edu- 
cational standards  applied  at  the  entrance  gate  or  gates  to 
the  service.  The  value  of  a  well  rounded  general  educational 
and  cultural  equipment  for  an  administrative  position  in  the 
public  service  is  a  question  on  which  opinions  may  differ 
widely.  In  the  business  world,  the  widest  variations  of  prac- 
tice are  found.  Instances  can  be  cited  of  large  and  successful 
business  organizations  which  draw  their  executives  exclusively 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  253 

from  the  ranks  of  college  graduates,  recruiting  such  gradu- 
ates indeed  with  the  express  purpose  of  developing  them  into 
executives  as  rapidly  as  possible.  At  the  other  extreme  are 
equally  large  and  successful  organizations,  of  which  certain 
railroads  are  outstanding  examples,  which  admit  recruits  to 
their  service  only  at  so  low  a  level  as  to  preclude  entirely  the 
possibility  of  a  college  education  and  to  make  even  a  secondary 
schooling  wholly  unlikely,  and  which  fill  even  the  positions  of 
highest  responsibility  exclusively  by  the  advancement  of  those 
who  have  entered  at  that  level. 

The  tradition  of  the  public  service  in  this  country  has  been 
averse  historically  to  the  restriction  of  public  office  of  an  ad- 
ministrative character  to  the  "educated"  classes.  The  his- 
torians of  the  Jacksonian  democracy  have  justly  pointed  out 
that  the  doctrine  of  rotation  in  office  had  its  roots  not  merely 
in  the  policy  that  as  many  as  possible  should  have  a  share  in 
the  honor  and  emoluments  of  public  office,  but  in  the  sincere 
belief  that  the  average  man  was  fully  equal  to  the  demands  of 
office.  To  no  small  degree  this  historical  attitude  has  influ- 
enced the  practice  even  in  those  jurisdictions  in  which  person- 
nel administration  has  been  developed  most  fully,  including 
the  federal  service. 

In  the  clerical  service,  in  which  the  question  is  presented 
perhaps  in  its  most  important  form,  the  general  rule  prior  to 
the  war  had  been  to  recruit  only  at  the  lowest  level,  that  of 
clerk,  typist,  or  stenographer  at  entrance  rates  of  $600  to 
$1,000,  and  to  regard  those  so  entering,  or  rather  the  men  so 
entering,  for  the  tradition  has  been  against  the  advancement 
of  women  beyond  fairly  low  levels,  as  eligible  through  long 
service  to  the  highest  administrative  positions  of  a  perma- 
nent non-political  character;  and,  generally  speaking,  to  re- 
strict selection  for  those  positions  to  those  already  in  the 
service,  in  the  particular  bureau  or  service  in  which  the  vacancy 
occurs.  While  there  have  been  occasional  exceptions  to  the 
rule,  it  may  be  said  that  in  normal  times  the  permanent  com- 
petitive positions  of  a  purely  administrative,  as  opposed  to  a 
technical,   character  have  quite  generally  been  filled   in  this 


254  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

way.^  During  the  war  the  rapid  expansion  of  some  of  the 
permanent  services,  and  the  creation  of  many  new  opes,  in 
great  part  suspended  this  tradition;  and  in  the  abnormal  con- 
ditions which  have  characterized  the  months  since  the  cessation 
of  hostihties  the  situation  on  this  head  has  remained  confused. 
It  may  be  assumed,  however,  that  with  the  restabiHzation  of 
conditions  the  tradition  will  regain  most  of  its  old-time  force. 
The  British  Personnel  System. — The  tradition  of  thus 
filling  the  higher  non-technical  administrative  positions  ex- 
clusively by  the  promotion  of  those  who  have  originally  en- 
tered the  service  in  the  lowest  clerical  grades  presents  a  sharp 
contrast  to  the  practice  prevailing  in  the  British  Civil  Service. 
In  that  service,  the  higher  non-technical  administrative  posi- 
tions are  filled  in  perhaps  80  or  90  per  cent  of  the  cases  by  the 
promotion  of  clerks  recruited  not  at  the  lowest  grade  but  at  an 
intermediate  grade,  through  special  examination.  Those  re- 
cruited in  the  lower  grade  are  commonly  termed  second  divi- 
sion clerks,^  while  those  recruited  at  the  upper  grade  are  termed 
first  division  clerks.  Those  who  enter  as  second  division  clerks 
may  indeed  advance  to  the  higher  grades  of  clerical  work; 
but  to  the  administrative  posts  classed  as  "first  division  clerk- 
ships" they  may  advance  (after  eight  years  of  service)  only 
in  the  rarest  instances.^  These  posts  are  normally  reserved 
for  the  "first  division"  clerks  who,  though  they  perform  routine 
work  at  entrance,  are  regarded  as  merely  in  training  for  ad- 
vanced posts. 

The  theory  responsible   for  this   stratification  is  seen  in 

*  A  recent  illustrative  exception  to  this  rule  was  the  filling  of  the 
position  of  Chief  Clerk,  Bureau  of  Education,  by  open  competition.  It 
is  doubtful  if  there  is  another  position  of  Chief  Clerk  of  an  established 
bureau  in  the  federal  service  which  has  been  filled  other  than  by  selec- 
tion   from    within. 

^  There  is  a  still  lower  grade  known  as  "boy  clerks'' ;  but  employment 
in  this  grade  is  regarded  as  temporary,  the  boy,  who  must  be  between 
14  and  17  years  of  age  at  entrance,  being  required  to  leave  the  service 
when  the  upper  age  limit  is  reached  if  he  has  not  obtained  appointment 
to  the  second  division  grade. 

^  The  second  division  clerks  have  been  insistent  for  years  in  their 
demand  that  the  opportunity  for  promotion  to  the  first  division  be  en- 
larged, and  the  tendency  has  been  increasingly  in  this  direction.  It  is 
not  known  at  this  writing  what  effect  the  war  may  have  had,  or  may 
have,  upon  this  situation. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  255 

the  age  limits  and  in  the  character  of  the  examinations  fixed 
for  the  two  grades.  Second  division  clerks  at  entrance  must 
be  between  the  ages  of  17  and  20,  the  plan  obviously  being 
to  recruit  boys  who  have  had  substantially  a  secondary  school 
education,  and  the  examination  for  entrance  to  the  second 
division  follows  fairly  closely  the  course  of  instruction  in  the 
English  secondary  schools.  The  first  division  clerks,  on  the 
other  hand,  are  required  to  be  between  22  and  24  years  of  age, 
and  the  examination  is  closely  fitted  to  the  course  of  study  in 
the  universities.^  The  theory  thus  is  that  the  higher  posts 
should  be  filled  chiefly  by  those  who  have  had  the  advantages 
of  a  broad  general  education,  and  that  only  in  case  of  very 
exceptional  merit  should  those  whose  education  has  been  re- 
stricted to  the  common  or  secondary  school  standard  be  per- 
mitted to  advance  to  an  administrative  post  of  major  or  even 
intermediate  responsibility.^ 

Applicability  of  British  System  to  American  Conditions. — 
It  would  not  be  correct,  however,  to  leave  the  impression 
that  those  who  were  recruited  for  clerical  positions  in  the  fed- 
eral service  at  the  lowest  grade  before  the  war  were  invariably 

*"As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  papers  in  mathematics  and  natural  science 
are  based  upon  the  requirements  for  honor  degrees  at  Cambridge,  and 
the  papers  in  classical  and  other  subjects  upon  those  at  Oxford;  and 
thus  it  happens  that  by  far  the  larger  number  of  successful  candidates 
come  from  one  or  the  other  of  these  two  great  universities."  Lowell, 
The  Government  of  England,  vol.  I,  p.  163.  The  fact  that  the  examina- 
tion favors  those  who  come  from  Oxford  and  Cambridge  and  that  these 
institutions  are  traditionally  the  institutions  for  the  upper  middle  class 
and  the  aristocracy  has  caused  the  British  system  to  be  condemned  as 
an  aristocratic  institution  and,  in  practice,  it  doubtless  is.  So  far  as  the 
theory  here  under  discussion  is  concerned,  however,  the  essential  feature 
of  the  British  system  is  merely  that  it  sets  a  high  educational  standard 
for  entrance  to  the  first  division.  This  theory  in  no  wise  would  be  im- 
paired were  the  British  Civil  Service  Commission  so  to  alter  the  content 
and  forrn  of  the  examinations  as  to  give  those  who  have  studied  at 
the  provincial  .(that  is,  traditionally  the  middle  class)  universities  an 
equal  opportunity  with  those  from  Oxford  and  Cambridge.  Were  this 
done,  the  system  would  be  aristocratic  only  to  the  extent  that  any  re- 
quirement of  educational  qualifications  is  aristocratic. 

^  It  should  be  noted  that  there  is  nothing  in  the  rules  to  prevent  a 
second  division  clerk  who,  by  self-education  or  evening  study,  has  mas- 
tered the  subjects  of  the  examination,  from  entering  the  first  division 
examination  on  an  equal  footing  with  those  who  have  studied  at  the 
universities.  The  facilities  for  study  of  this  kind  in  England  and  the 
high  standard  of  scholarship  required  by  the  examiners  make  it  virtually 
impossible,  however,  for  such  a  case  to  occur. 


256  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

inferior  to  the  typical  first  division  clerk  entering  the  British 
service.  Such  is  far  from  the  case.  The  compensation  for- 
merly paid  at  entrance  to  the  lowest  clerical  grades  was  in 
excess  of  that  obtaining  for  the  same  grade  of  service  in  private 
employment,  and,  as  respects  Washington,  an  added  induce- 
ment was  offered  by  the  many  opportunities  in  that  city,  for 
securing  a  professional  or  academic  education  of  which  oppor- 
tunities the  federal  employees  are  enabled  to  take  advantage 
by  reason  of  the  favorable  working  hours  in  the  departments. 
Owing  to  these  factors  the  lowest  clerical  grades  in  the  past 
contained  a  goodly  percentage  of  persons  of  educational  quali- 
fications not  greatly,  if  at  all,  below  the  average  of  the  first 
division  clerks  in  the  British  service;  and  although  many  of 
the  recruits  of  this  type  left  the  service  after  a  relatively  short 
period,  others  remained  and,  despite  the  influence  which 
seniority  exercises  in  the  federal  promotion  system,  have  found 
their  way  to  administrative  positions.  These  factors  have  made 
possible  the  practice  of  filling  the  higher  non-technical  admin- 
istrative positions  by  the  successive  promotion  of  those  re- 
cruited at  the  lowest  grade.  In  view  of  the  altered  conditions 
in  respect  to  compensation  in  the  service  at  the  present  time, 
it  is  doubtful  whether  this  policy  can  continue  to  give  equally 
good  results.  It  is  thus  a  question  whether  a  system,  follow- 
ing in  theory  the  British  system,  and  encouraging  the  en- 
trance into  the  federal  service,  at  a  somewhat  higher  level, 
of  persons  of  superior  educational  attainments  may  not  be 
desirable. 

Doubtless  some  will  urge  that  awarding  a  higher  entrance 
rate  to  one  merely  because  he  possesses  a  superior  general 
education  is  "undemocratic"  or  even  "aristocratic."  It  is  not 
believed,  however,  that  the  objection  will  stand  examination. 
The  requirement  of  a  technical  education  where  appropriate  is 
everywhere  accepted  as  unobjectionable  on  any  grounds  of 
social  or  political  philosophy,  and  it  is  diffcult  to  see  why 
emphasis  on  an  academic  education,  where  appropriate,  is  any 
more  open  to  attack  on  these  grounds.  The  entire  absence 
of  class  character   in   the   student   population   of   the   United 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  257 

States  makes  any  analogy  on  this  head  drawn  from  British 
or  other  foreign  experience  wholly  valueless. 

At  one  point,  however,  the  British  tradition  should  be 
sharply  departed  from.  Under  the  British  practice,  the  first 
division  clerk  has  a  first  call  on  superior  promotions,  and  it 
is  only  in  case  of  extraordinary  merit  that  a  second  division 
clerk  is  able  to  displace  him.  This  is  manifestly  unjust.  The 
two  types  of  recruits  should  be  placed  upon  an  equality,  and 
as  each  vacancy  occurs  the  promotion  should  be  made  upon  a 
fair  competition  (whether  formal  or  informal)  between  all 
those  eligibles,  however  recruited.  If  the  theory  be  valid  that 
superior  educational  attainments  give  to  the  employee  a  value 
equal  to,  if  not  greater  than,  that  resulting  from  a  longer  appli- 
cation to  and  familiarity  with  the  routine  and  detailed  working 
processes  of  the  organization,  the  employee  who  entered  at 
the  higher  level  because  of  those  educational  advantages  in 
general  should  have  no  difficulty  in  demonstrating  his  superi- 
ority. If  he  is  unable  to  do  so  there  is,  of  course,  no  reason 
why,  merely  because  of  the  superiority  of  the  average  of  his 
type,  he  should  be  preferred  to  the  employee  who  entered  at 
the  low  level. 

The  view  here  taken  with  respect  to  the  run  of  non-technical 
administrative  positions  is  applicable  also  to  such  specialized 
services  as  the  postal  service.  Substantially  the  recommenda- 
tions here  made  have  been  made  in  fact  by  a  former  first 
assistant  postmaster  general,  whose  subsequent  administra- 
tive success  in  other  branches  of  the  government  service  lends 
a  special  interest  to  his  views.  Discussing  the  problem  of  the 
higher  supervisory  positions  in  the  postal  service,  and  par- 
ticularly the  question  of  the  best  method  of  filling  postmaster- 
ships  now  that  the  merit  basis  has  been  established  for  these 
positions,  after  pointing  out  that  the  present  requirements  for 
entrance  to  the  postal  service  cover  merely  a  common  school 
education,  he  says  :  ^ 

In  the  interest  of  the  postal  employees  and  those  who  are 
hereafter  to  enter  the  postal  service,  it  should  be  recognized 

^  The  United  States  Post-Ofdce,  by  Daniel  C.  Roper,  p.  284. 


258  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

that  the  increasing  complexity  of  the  service  gives  rise  to  the 
need  for  training  in  some  way  a  superior  class  of  postal  em- 
ployees who  may  be  promoted  into  positions  of  responsibility 
both  as  experts  and  as  executives.  The  object  of  this  would 
be  to  broaden  the  source  from  which  the  Government  may 
secure  men  well  prepared  for  the  high  positions,  including  that 
of  postmaster. 

It  is  just  as  necessary  that  the  army  of  postal  employees 
should  be  officered  by  men  of  specialized  training  as  it  is  that 
our  Army  and  Navy  should  secure  a  large  number  of  their 
officers  from  the  graduates  of  West  Point  and  Annapolis. 
.  .  .  Those  who  enter  the  postal  service  as  clerks  and  carriers 
should  be  eligible  for  promotion  to  any  position  in  the  postal 
service,  but  before  rising  above  the  rank  of  foreman  they 
should  be  required  to  take  an  examination  of  a  higher  grade 
than  that  under  which  they  entered  the  service.  Another  class 
of  recruits  to  the  postal  service  should  be  young  men  espe- 
cially selected,  employed  at  a  nominal  wage,  and  trained  in 
the  Post  Office  Department  at  Washington  and  in  model  train- 
ing post  offices.  These  young  men  should  be  required  to  pass 
frequent  examinations,  and  after  completing  the  course  be 
available  for  appointment  to  clerkships  in  the  Department  and 
to  any  work  in  the  field,  including  minor  supervisory  positions 
at  post  offices. 

It  should  be  noted  that  the  argument  here  is  not  for  the 
present  system  of  applying  the  principle  of  selection  from 
within  to  all  positions  except  those  designated  as  "postmaster" 
and  filling  that  by  open  competition;  it  is  for  the  recognition 
of  a  level  of  recruitment  higher  than  that  represented  by  the 
average  of  the  clerks  and  carriers  now  recruited,  with  special 
training  provided  for  the  capable  recruits  from  both  levels, 
and  with  both  competing  freely  for  the  higher  posts  of  the 
service.  It  proposes  substantially  the  application  to  the  postal 
service  of  the  British  theory,  qualified  as  above,  urged  in  the 
discussion  of  the  clerical  service. 

Provision  of  Educational  Facilities. — In  the  foregoing 
sections  emphasis  has  been  placed  upon  the  extent  to  which 
advancement  in  the  service  must  depend  upon  educational 
equipment;  and  it  has  been  pointed  out  that  if  the  experience 
in  the  work  of  the  lower  grades  in  no  wise   furnishes  such 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  259 

education  and  is  in  no  wise  equivalent  to  it,  it  must  ]>e  obtained 
by  the  employee,  if  at  all,  entirely  apart  from  his  working 
duties.  In  the  case  of  many  positions,  however,  the  working 
conditions  make  it  highly  improbable,  if  not  altogether  im- 
possible, that  their  incumbents  can  acquire  the  education  neces- 
sary for  advancement.  They  do  this,  of  course,  in  the  first 
place,  by  requiring  the  employee's  time.  Even  a  normal  work- 
ing day  will  prevent  the  employee  from  giving  the  time  re- 
quired for  the  more  difficult  kinds  of  preparation.  Frequently 
they  deprive  him  of  access  to  educational  institutions  both  be- 
cause of  hours  of  labor  and  of  the  place  in  which  his  duties 
must  be  performed,  though  the  situation  on  the  first  head  is 
continually  improving,  owing  to  the  development  of  facilities 
for  evening  instruction.  Finally,  in  some  positions  it  is  doubt- 
less true  that  the  duties  of  the  position  tend  to  hinder  the  em- 
ployee from  obtaining  the  necessary  education  merely  by  af- 
fording him  so  little  opportunity  for  the  exercise  of  his  intel- 
ligence as  to  make  concentrated  mental  effort  outside  of  work- 
ing hours  difficult.  Consequently,  the  suggestion  has  been 
put  forth  in  various  guises  that  the  government  should  rec- 
ognize an  obligation  toward  those  in  the  service  who  are  sub- 
stantially cut  off  from  advancement  through  lack  of  educational 
attaininents,  to  make  it  possible  for  them  to  acquire  the  neces- 
sary educational  preparation  with  much  less  difficulty  and  hard- 
ship than  is  now  the  case.  This  is  to  be  done,  in  part,  by  re- 
ducing the  working  time  or  adjusting  the  working  hours  where 
necessary  to  permit  the  employee  to  pursue  further  study  and, 
in  certain  cases  where  existing  facilities  for  study  are  not  avail- 
able or  appropriate,  to  develop  new  facilities.  Closely  bound 
up  with  these  proposals  is  the  suggestion  that  in  certain  cases 
the  expenses  of  tuition  of  the  employee  be  assumed  by  the 
service. 

Although  these  suggestions  are  based  primarily  on  the 
anticipated  benefits  to  the  personnel  system  through  increased 
attractiveness  of  the  service  and  improved  morale,  they  make 
a  strong  appeal  from  still  another  angle,  that  of  equality,  or 
rather  equalization,  of  opportunity.     So  far  as  the  lack  of 


26o  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

educational  attainments  on  the  part  of  subordinate  personnel 
is  due  to  a  lack  of  opportunity  resulting  from  financial  causes, 
anything  which  the  service  may  do  in  the  way  of  helping  the 
handicapped  employee  to  overcome  this  disadvantage  tends  to 
neutralize  the  existing  inequalities  of  opportunity  for  educa- 
tion and  for  economic  success.  It  need  hardly  be  said,  how- 
ever, that  meritorious  as  any  effort  in  this  direction  undoubt- 
edly is,  its  effect  on  the  social  situation  generally  must  be 
negligible;  nor  is  the  matter  one  which  the  personnel  adminis- 
trator is  concerned  with  to  the  extent  of  allowing  his  policy  to 
be  materially  affected  thereljy.  Nevertheless,  it  is  a  considera- 
tion not  to  be  disregarded,  and  where  the  balance  of  conven- 
ience seems  to  be  about  even,  it  may  well  be  permitted  to 
influence  the  decision  in  favor  of  providing  the  facilities  for 
instruction. 

Once  the  principle  is  admitted  that  the  service  is  under 
obligation  to  provide  educational  facilities  through  wdiich  those 
in  lower  ranks  may  equip  themselves  for  promotion,  the  prob- 
lem becomes  the  practical  one  of  determining  the  several  points 
in  the  service  where  such  facilities  might  be  supplied.  Against 
the  cost  of  supplying  the  facilities  and  the  cost  of  allowing  the 
employees  any  necessary  time  for  study  must  be  balanced  the 
returns  to  the  service  in  better  personnel  in  the  lower  ranks, 
better  service,  and  morale,  and,  in  addition,  the  social  benefits 
of  an  equalization  of  opportunity. 

There  is  perhaps  no  theoretical  limit  at  which  the  provision 
of  educational  facilities  must  stop.  In  the  military  and  naval 
services  in  peace  time,  when  the  amount  of  productive  work 
w^hich  must  be  accomplished  is  relatively  slight,  an  enormous 
proportion  of  the  facilities  and  of  working  time  is  devoted  to 
the  education  of  the  personnel.  In  the  civil  service,  however, 
where  productive  activity  is  the  normal  rather  than  the  abnor- 
mal condition,  there  are  olwiously  very  severe  limitations  on 
the  extent  of  the  opportunities  for  education  which  can  be  pro- 
vided with  reasonal)le  economy  of  facilities  and  time. 

So  far  as  the  personnel  at  Washington  is  concerned,  the 
existing   facilities   in   almost   every   common   field   are    fairly 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  261 

ample.  Not  a  few  special  fields  might  be  found,  however, 
particularly  in  technical  branches,  in  which  virtually  no  facilities 
are  at  present  available.  Here  the  government  could,  with 
a  minimum  of  expenses  and  difficulty,  develop  facilities  of  its 
own  that  would  not  only  be  of  the  highest  value  for  the  per- 
sonnel system,  but  would  make  a  unique  contribution  to  the 
intellectual  progress  of  the  nation  in  all  the  fields  on  which 
governmental  activities  impinge  and  would  be  a  most  bene- 
ficial stimulus  to  the  mental  vitality  and  energy  of  the  technical 
and  administrative  forces  of  the  government.  Possessing  in 
its  staff  of  technical  workers  the  makings  of  a  distinguished 
faculty,  in  its  buildings,  libraries,  and  laboratories  a  varied 
and  amply  adequate  plant,  and  in  the  current  problems  of  the 
several  services  living  working  material  not  possessed  by  any 
university  in  the  land,  the  government  could  readily  build  up 
at  Washington,  at  small  expense,  an  institution  as  valuable  as 
it  would  be  novel,  in  which  the  government  employee  of  native 
capacity  and  ambition  could  acquire,  under  the  most  favorable 
conditions,  the  specialized  instruction  thought  necessary  for 
his  advancement  to  higher  responsibility. 

Even  with  respect  to  existing  facilities  for  conventional 
courses  of  instruction  at  Washington,  much  could  be  done  un- 
questionably by  the  government,  acting  through  some  central 
personnel  authority,  and  in  cooperation  with  representatives 
of  the  various  services  and  of  the  various  classes  of  employees 
affected,  greatly  to  improve  these  facilities,  both  in  respect  to 
quality  of  instruction  and  physical  plant  and  in  respect  to 
preparedness  for  and  responsiveness  to  the  needs  of  the  gov- 
ernment service.  Up  to  the  present  time,  it  may  be  said  that 
practically  no  action  has  been  taken  on  this  head.  The  gov- 
ernment has  permitted  a  considerable  number  of  educational 
institutions  of  all  grades  to  exist  in  the  Capital,  supported 
chiefly  and,  in  some  cases,  virtually  solely  by  the  government 
personnel,  but  has  taken  almost  no  interest  in  the  quality  or 
character  of  the  instruction  offered.  This  is  not  the  place  in 
which  to  attempt  any  specific  suggestions  as  to  what  might  be 
accomplished  by  such  activity  on  the  part  of  the  government 


262  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

personnel  authorities  as  is  here  suggested  in  any  given  field 
of  education,  but  any  one  familiar  with  the  conditions  exist- 
ing in  any  particular  major  branch  of  instruction  at  the  seat 
of  government  will  find  no  difficulty  in  thinking  of  ways  in 
which  the  current  situation  might  be  improved  along  the  lines 
suggested. 

Outside  of  Washington  there  are  few  centers  in  which 
the  number  of  federal  employees  would  warrant  the  provision 
by  the  government  itself  of  special  facilities  for  the  education 
of  its  personnel  or  for  the  intervention  by  the  government  on 
behalf  of  its  personnel  in  the  educational  activities  being  car- 
ried on  by  non-governmental  institutions.  Consequently,  ad- 
ditional interest  attaches  to  the  suggestion  made  at  another 
point  in  this  volume,  that  the  service  at  Washington,  so  far 
as  possible,  should  be  recruited  by  the  detail  of  employees  from 
the  field  establishments.  To  the  extent  to  which  this  could  be 
done  without  detriment  to  the  service,  the  departmental  service 
at  Washington,  in  conjunction  with  educational  facilities  super- 
vised and  encouraged  by  the  government,  might  be  made  the 
educational  center  for  the  entire  federal  service. 

The  question  of  working  hours  as  afifecting  opportunity 
for  education  is  one  which  does  not  present  itself  in  an  im- 
portant way  over  most  branches  of  the  service.  The  hours 
of  labor  in  the  departments  at  Washington,  and  generally  at 
the  large  centers  of  the  country  where  alone  the  question  really 
presents  itself,  are  sufficiently  short  to  make  it  possible  for  the 
ambitious  employee  to  pursue  all  but  the  most  difficult  and 
exacting  courses  of  study.  It  may  truly  be  said  perhaps  that 
under  existing  requirements  medicine,  dentistry,  and  civil, 
mechanical,  and  electrical  engineering  are  the  only  common 
vocations  or  professions  preparation  for  which  cannot  success- 
fully be  procured  by  the  employee  outside  of  working  hours, 
and  perhaps  even  the  engineering  courses  should  be  excluded 
from  this  statement.  So  far,  however,  as  the  question  does 
present  itself,  it  seems  desirable  that  a  limited  concession 
should  be  made  by  the  service  in  the  case  of  the  deserving  em- 
ployee whose  working  hours  do  not  permit  his  pursuing  an 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  263 

appropriate  educational  course  to  the  best  advantage.  Needless 
to  say,  this  is  a  form  of  privilege  which  must  be  carefully 
safeguarded,  both  as  to  extent  of  allowance  of  time  and  as  to 
the  number  of  employees  to  whom  it  is  extended.  The  same 
may  be  said  with  even  greater  emphasis  with  respect  to  any 
plan  for  the  assumption  by  the  government  in  whole  or  in 
part  of  the  expenses  of  tuition  of  the  employee. 

It  may  be  said  in  passing  that  although  the  proposal  that 
the  government  should  in  any  wise  concern  itself  with  the 
educational  advancement  of  its  employees,  or  still  more,  should 
assume  a  portion  of  the  expenses  of  such  education,  either 
by  way  of  remission  of  working  time  or  by  actual  contribution 
of  tuition  cost,  may  seem  novel,  yet  precisely  this  policy  has 
been  followed  in  the  military  and  naval  services  for  years.  In 
those  services  it  has  happened  frequently  that  when  a  need 
arose  or  was  anticipated  for  a  particular  type  of  technical 
service  which  could  have  been  secured  in  the  open  market,  the 
policy  has  been  followed  of  taking  officers,  or  even  in  some 
cases  enlisted  men,  already  in  the  service  and  giving  them  the 
necessary  training  at  an  expense  far  in  excess  of  what  would 
have  been  required  to  bring  in  civilian  technicians  and  to  in- 
struct them  in  whatever  details  of  military  practice  or  pro- 
cedure might  have  been  necessary.  Many  hold  that  in  the 
military  and  naval  services  this  tradition  has  been  carried  to 
a  wholly  unnecessary  extreme,  and  it  is  not  by  any  means  the 
intention  here  to  argue  that  any  policy  which  may  be  adopted 
for  the  educational  advancement  of  the  civilian  personnel 
should  be  governed  by  the  military  tradition,  but  merely  to 
point  out  that  the  proposition  is  more  novel  in  appearance  than 
in  reality. 

In  summary,  the  danger  of  educational  requirements  as 
related  to  selection  from  within  is  on  the  one  hand  that  of  con- 
fining recruitment  to  such  low  levels  as  to  deprive  the  service 
of  the  possibility  of  securing  persons  of  advanced  educational 
equipment;  and  on  the  other  that  of  emphasizing  educational 
requirements  to  such  a  degree  that  at  several  successive  levels 
recruitment  from  outside  the  service  must  be  resorted  to  to 


264  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

secure  persons  \\  ith  tlie  required  educational  attainments,  thus 
closing  the  door  of  promise  in  the  face  of  the  lower  employees. 
The  radical,  and  the  only  thoroughly  satisfactory,  solution  of 
the  difficulty  is  to  be  found,  it  is  believed,  not  in  lowering 
the  educational  standards  fairly  demanded  by  the  needs  of  the 
service,  but  in  making  it  possible  for  the  employee  in  the  lower 
grades  to  acquire  the  educational  equipment  necessary  for  his 
advancement  to  the  higher.  This  is  not  to  say  that  the  gov- 
ernment is  to  proceed  forthwith  to  provide  higher  education, 
in  working  time,  for  the  whole  of  the  subordinate  personnel, 
but  it  means  that  so  far  as  practicable  those  of  the  subordinate 
personnel  who  show  sufficient  promise  should  be  provided  with 
facilities,  and  with  a  certain  allowance  of  time,  for  securing 
the  advanced  education  needed  for  the  posts  in  the  natural 
line  of  promotion. 

What  is  here  suggested  is  an  entirely  different  matter  from 
the  proposal  for  training  for  the  public  service  of  which  so 
much  was  formerly,  and  occasionally  still  is,  heard.  That  pro- 
posal sees  the  service  as  a  special  field  for  which  no  adequate 
preparation  is  now  afiforded  by  existing  educational  institu- 
tions, or  by  business  experience,  and  consequently  aims  to 
create  training  of  this  kind.  In  a  subsequent  section  this  view 
is  examined  and  the  conclusion  reached  that  there  are  only  a  few 
positions  in  the  public  service  which  should  properly  be  filled 
from  without  the  service  and  for  which  adequate  preparation 
cannot  be  had  through  existing  institutions  or  through  the 
ordinary  course  of  business  experience  and  that  where  such 
positions  do  exist  there  can  be  no  better  method  of  training 
than  that  of  bringing  into  the  service  an  intelligent  and  am- 
bitious young  personnel  and  training  it  for  the  special  work 
involved  through  the  medium  of  the  work  itself. 
The  Area  of  Selection  from  Within. — The  foregoing  dis- 
cussion has  been  confined  to  the  principle  of  restricting  se- 
lection to  those  within  the  service  as  against  resorting  to  gen- 
eral competition.  For  the  sake  of  simplicity  in  discussion,  all 
consideration  has  been  omitted  of  the  fact  that  once  the  prin- 
ciple  of   restricting  selection   to   those   within   the   service   is 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  265 

decided  upon  a  distinct  but  cognate  pro1>lem  is  encountered  in 
its  application.  Upon  the  answer  which  is  given  to  this  internal 
question  depends  in  large  measure  the  practicability  of  applying 
the  principle  as  against  general  competition.  Stated  in  its 
simplest  terms,  this  question  is  to  what  precise  area  of  the 
service  shall  selection  from  within  normally  be  confined;  and 
if  suitable  candidates  are  not  forthcoming  from  so  limited  an 
area,  what  additional  area  or  successive  areas  shall  be  drawn 
upon  in  the  attempt  to  fill  the  position  by  selection  from  within 
before  open  competition  is  resorted  to?  To  put  the  case  con- 
cretely :  a  vacancy  arises  in  the  position  of  the  chief  accounting 
clerk  of  one  of  the  federal  services.  The  position  is  one  which, 
in  the  nature  of  the  case,  might  normally  be  expected  to  be 
satisfactorily  filled  by  selection  from  within  the  service.  In 
the  federal  service  no  system  of  formal  competition  for  pro- 
motion obtains ;  and  hence  the  question  of  the  area  of  the 
service  from  within  which  the  appointing  oflicer  is  to  be  ex- 
pected to  make  his  selection  does  not  present  itself  as  sharply 
as  it  does  in  those  jurisdictions  where  formal  competition  for 
promotion  does  obtain.  Nevertheless,  the  question  is  there; 
whether  formally  or  subconsciously,  the  appointing  officer 
manifestly  has  in  mind  in  the  first  instance,  a  particular  limited 
area  of  the  service  from  within  which  his  selection  is  to  be 
made  if  a  suitable  candidate  can  be  found  at  all.  This  area 
may  be  merely  the  particular  division  of  the  office  concerned 
with  the  accounting  work;  it  may  be  the  accounting  offices  of 
the  services  both  in  Washington  and  in  the  field ;  it  may  possibly 
include  all  the  accounting  offices  of  the  department,  including 
those  of  other  services,  and  it  may  conceivably  extend  to  the 
accounting  offices  of  other  departments  having  accounting  prob- 
lems more  or  less  cognate  to  those  encountered  in  the  service 
in  question ;  finally,  it  may  embrace  these  several  areas  in  suc- 
cession, the  zone  being  successively  widened  as  one  after  the 
other  is  found  to  yield  insufficient  material  for  selection.  What, 
in  correct  theory,  should  be  the  original  area  of  selection  in 
this  case,  and  what  are  the  successive  areas  of  extension?  What 
should  be  the  final  extent  of  the  area  of  selection  from  within, 


266  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

beyond  which  the  attempt  to  restrict  selection  to  those  within 
the  service  should  be  abandoned  and  general  competition  re- 
sorted to?  Manifestly  these  are  questions  which  go  to  the 
root  of  the  whole  principle  of  selection  from  within.  Mani- 
festly, too,  they  admit  of  no  facile  or  general  answer. 

At  first  sight  it  might  be  thought  that  the  principle  of 
convenience,  which  dictates  the  restriction  of  selection  to  those 
already  within  the  service  unless  substantial  reason  exists  for 
the  belief  that  better  results  will  be  obtained  by  resort  to  gen- 
eral competition,  would  also  furnish  the  answer  to  the  present 
question;  that  the  natural  rule  would  be  that  selection  is  to 
be  restricted  to  as  small  an  area  of  the  service  adjacent  to  the 
particular  vacancy  as  is  consistent  with  the  probability  of  find- 
ing within  that  area  a  sufficient  quantity  of  available  material 
to  make  satisfactory  selection  possible,  and  that  just  as  gen- 
eral competition  should  be  resorted  to  only  when  selection  from 
within  seems  unlikely  to  produce  sufficient  material  of  the  de- 
sired quality,  so  the  area  of  selection  from  within  should  be 
successively  widened  only  to  the  degree  necessary  to  insure  an 
adequate  quantity  of  material  for  selection. 

On  further  examination,  however,  it  will  be  apparent  that 
an  additional  factor  of  the  first  importance  seriously  qualifies 
the  validity  of  this  rule  of  convenience.  This  factor  is  the 
.need  for  equalizing  opportunity  over  the  whole  service.  The 
various  units  of  organization  of  the  government,  each  of  which 
might  be  designated  logically  as  a  distinct  area  to  which  selec- 
tion is  to  be  restricted  for  any  vacancy  in  a  particular  class 
of  work  occurring  in  that  unit,  vary  widely  in  size,  in  their 
rate  of  expansion,  in  the  opportunities  for  passage  to  private 
employment,  and  in  various  other  respects,  all  afTecting  the 
frequency  and  character  of  the  opportunity  for  promotion 
within  their  confines.  If  selection  is  to  be  normally  restricted 
in  each  case  to  those  within  that  unit,  the  mere  accident  of 
original  entrance  into  or  assignment  to  one  or  another  branch 
of  the  service  obviously  will  seriously  affect  the  chances  of 
promotion  of  the  employee.  The  personnel  administrator 
must  consequently  so  apply  the   principle  of  selection    from 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  267 

within  as  to  equalize  as  nearly  as  may  be  the  opportunities  for 
advancement  of  all  those  engaged  in  a  particular  class  of  work. 

Needless  to  say,  there  are  serious  natural  limitations  to 
what  may  be  done  in  this  direction  without  detriment  to  the 
service.  Even  though  the  class  of  work  may  be  the  same, 
the  employee  who  has  served  in  the  organization  unit  in  which 
the  vacancy  occurs  obviously  will  have,  other  things  being 
equal,  a  greater  present  value  in  the  vacancy  than  the  employee 
coming  from  another  unit  of  the  organization.  The  question 
of  the  balance  of  convenience  thus  presented  between  the  need 
for  equalization  of  opportunity  for  advancement  on  the  one 
hand  and  the  need  for  present  economy  in  the  service  on  the 
other  is  a  nice  one  and  cannot  be  answered,  of  course,  in  any 
case  by  the  use  of  a  formula. 

When  the  area  for  selection  from  within  is  extended  be- 
yond a  particular  organization  in  which  the  vacancy  occurs, 
the  possibility  arises  and  becomes  greater  as  the  area  is  ex- 
tended, that  a  person  may  be  found  outside  that  particular 
unit  for  whom  appointment  to  the  vacancy  will  represent  not 
a  promotion,  that  is,  not  an  advancement  from  a  lower  to  a 
higher  grade  of  service,  but  a  mere  reassignment  within  the 
grade  in  which  he  is  already  employed.  Even  such  reassign- 
ment, presumably,  will  represent  an  advancement  for  this  em- 
ployee, or  he  would  not  seek  it  or  be  willing  to  accept  it,  but 
it  will  not  be  promotion  from  a  lower  to  a  higher  grade. 
Clearly,  viewed  from  the  standpoint  of  the  service  as  a  whole, 
a  favorable  vacancy  in  a  particular  grade  has  been  more  fully 
earned,  other  things  being  equal,  by  one  who  has  already  seen 
service  in  that  grade  in  a  less  favorable  assignment  than  by 
one  who  is  still  in  a  lower  grade. 

Nor  is  the  desirability  of  equalizing  the  opportunity  for 
promotion  the  sole  reason  why  freedom  of  movement  over 
as  large  an  area  of  the  service  as  practicable  should  be  en- 
couraged. In  the  course  of  business,  occasions  frequently 
arise  when  reassignment  or  redistribution  of  duties  has  to  be 
made;  and  situations  arise  too,  where,  in  the  interest  of  the 
service,  it  is  desirable  to  change  the  duties  assigned  to  a  given 


268  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

employee.  The  occasions  when  such  action  may  be  called 
for  are  too  familiar  to  need  more  than  mention.  Thus,  a  par- 
ticularly capable  employee,  with  large  promise  of  develop- 
ment, may  be  assigned  by  accident  to  duties  in  which  he  enjoys 
no  opportunity  to  fit  himself  for  more  advanced  work,  a  con- 
dition not  only  injurious  to  his  own  morale  and  efficiency  but 
injurious  to  the  service  generally,  since  it  represents  a  waste 
of  potential  ability,  never  too  plentiful,  which  the  service 
should  conserve.  Again,  an  estrangement  may  arise  between 
an  employee  and  a  superior  officer  which  impairs  the  effi- 
ciency of  both,  and  which  is  yet  the  result  either  of  accident 
or  a  temperamental  difficulty  not  fundamental  and  not  likely 
to  be  present  with  others.  Finally,  a  situation  not  infrequently 
arises  in  which  it  is  thought  that  a  particular  employee,  be- 
cause of  some  special  aptitude  or  interest,  is  more  likely  to 
produce  results  in  a  given  specific  set  of  duties  than  the  em- 
ployee now  performing  those  duties,  though  the  latter  may 
be,  in  general,  a  wholly  satisfactory  employee. 

Changes  in  assignments,  in  short  although  frecpiently  made 
at  the  instance  of  the  individual  employee  and  in  part  for  his 
benefit,  at  the  same  time  may  be  demanded  for  the  best  inter- 
ests of  the  service.  It  is,  consequently,  in  the  highest  degree 
desirable,  in  any  personnel  system,  that  as  great  a  freedom  in 
reassignment  should  exist  as  is  consistent  with  other  require- 
ments of  personnel  administration. 

The  extension,  rather  than  the  restriction  of  the  area  of 
selection  from  within,  commends  itself  from  still  another  point 
of  view — that  of  preventing  stagnation  in  the  service  by  mak- 
ing more  frequent  and  more  free  the  movement  of  individuals 
from  one  branch  of  the  service  to  another.  Since  persons 
transferred  to  areas  of  the  service  more  or  less  remote  from 
their  previous  assignments  have  to  spend  some  time  in  fa- 
miliarizing themselves  with  their  new  work,  there  is,  of  course, 
a  limit  beyond  which  the  free  movement  of  personnel  and  fre- 
quent changes  in  the  personnel  of  the  organization  will  be 
found  hurtful  to  the  efficiency  of  the  service  and  the  economy 
of  operation:  but  it  is  not  beUeved  that  under  ordinary  con- 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  269 

ditions  in  the  federal  service  there  will  be  much  danger  of 
this,  however  widely  the  area  of  selection  may  be  extended. 
The  need  for  definite  measures  to  prevent  stagnation  of  the 
service  is  so  great  as  to  outweigh  any  slight  danger  of  in- 
creased cost  of  service  which  may  inhere  in  the  extension  of 
the  area  of  selection. 

The  problem  of  the  proper  limits  of  the  area  of  selection 
presents  itself,  of  course,  with  great  variations  in  difficulty 
and  importance.  Some  classes  of  work  are  located  chiefly,  if 
not  exclusively,  in  a  single  branch  of  the  governmental  service, 
and  here  the  problem  is  a  relatively  simple  one.  Such  a  case 
is  that  of  the  geologists  employed  by  the  Geological  Survey. 
Virtually  no  other  branch  of  the  government  service  employs 
geologists  except  occasionally.  The  question  of  the  area  to 
which  selection  for  any  given  vacancy  should  be  restricted  in 
this  case  is  thus  simply  a  question  of  whether  it  should  be  re- 
stricted to  one  or  more  of  the  administrative  divisions  of  the 
Survey  or  should  be  extended  to  cover  all  its  geologists.  Since 
its  administrative  divisions  are  not  entirely  stable  and  the  op- 
erating relations  between  them  are  intimate,  and  the  geological 
work  required  in  them  is  not  radically  different,  the  decision 
here  naturally  would  be  that  the  whole  service  should  be  con- 
sidered as  a  unit  for  the  purpose  of  selection  from  within,  ex- 
cept perhaps  for  a  small  proportion  of  highly  specialized 
posts. 

At  the  other  extreme  are  classes  of  work  which  occur  in 
virtually  every  branch  of  the  service.  That  of  financial  ac- 
counting or  of  maintaining  personnel  records  and  administer- 
ing personnel  matters  readily  occur  as  examples  of  this  class. 
Here  a  variety  of  questions  present  themselves.  Selection 
may  be  restricted  to  those  engaged  in  this  work  in  the  par- 
ticular service  in  the  Washington  office,  or  may  be  extended 
to  include  also  those  in  the  field  establishments  of  the  service 
engaged  in  that  work.  Again  it  may  be  extended  to  em- 
brace all  services  of  the  same  executive  department,  whether 
to  those  employed  in  the  central  offices  at  Washington  or  in 
the  field  establishments.     Finally,  it  may  be  extended  to  in- 


270  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

elude  all,  in  whatever  department,  who  are  employed  in  a  given 
class  of  work  in  Washington  or  perhaps  even  through  the 
services  the  country  over.  In  each  case  the  decision  will  have 
to  be  made  by  balancing  the  advantage  of  enlarging  the  num- 
ber from  among  whom  selection  may  be  made  and  of  opening 
to  those  in  the  least  favored  services  an  opportunity  for  ad- 
vancement which  might  otherwise  be  lacking,  against  the  dis- 
advantage involved  in  filling  the  vacancy  by  one  not  familiar 
with  the  detail  of  the  special  problems  or  conditions  of  the 
particular  service  or  branch  in  which  the  vacancy  exists. 

So  far  as  the  latter  disadvantage  exists,  it  may  be  noted, 
it  is  not  likely  to  be  any  more  serious  in  many  cases  when  the 
person  appointed  comes  from  a  wholly  different  department 
than  when  he  comes  from  another  service  of  the  same  de- 
partment. In  many  instances  the  fields  of  work,  and  conse- 
quently the  detailed  problems  of  operation,  of  two  services  of 
the  same  executive  department  bear  no  more  relation  to  each 
other  than  do  those  of  totally  distinct  departments.  The- 
oretically, of  course,  this  should  not  be  so,  but  that  it  is  so  no 
one  familiar  with  the  present  distribution  of  functions  among 
the  executive  departments  will  question  for  a  moment.  While, 
therefore,  in  theory  it  might  appear  that  a  more  complete  case 
ought  to  be  made  out  for  extending  the  area  of  selection  to  an- 
other department  than  for  extending  it  merely  to  other  serv- 
ices of  the  same  department,  the  facts  of  the  present  situation 
lend  little  support  to  this  view. 

From  the  various  considerations  just  reviewed,  it  must  be 
apparent  that  no  precise  formula  can  be  developed  by  which 
the  area  of  selection  within  the  service  desirable  in  any  par- 
ticular case  may  be  determined.  All  that  can  be  offered  in  a 
discussion  like  the  present  one  is  that  the  problem  is  mani- 
festly one  requiring  close  and  continuous  study ;  that  it  cannot 
be  met  by  arbitrary  regulations  designed  to  cover  all  cases; 
and  that  the  central  personnel  authority  should  be  ever  in  search 
of  opportunities  to  extend  the  area  of  selection  where  desirable. 

None  of  these  requirements  is  satisfied  by  the  situation  now 
obtaining  in  the  federal  service.     The  problem  of  the  proper 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  271 

definition  of  the  area  of  selection  from  within  for  the  several 
classes  of  service  has  never  been  studied  in  any  comprehensive 
way.  The  current  practice  on  this  head  is  almost  wholly  the 
result  of  independent  and  uncoordinated  departmental  action. 
Attitude  of  Ciznl  Scrince  Coiiuiiission. — So  far  as  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  is  concerned,  its  action  to  date  has  not 
only  been  not  constructive;  it  has  been  decidedly  restrictive. 
At  the  instance  of  the  Commission,  the  President  has  promul- 
gated rules,  the  details  of  which  will  be  reviewed  shortly, 
which  materially  limit  the  power  of  the  appointing  oflEicer  to 
enlarge  to  the  fullest  extent  which  he  may  deem  necessary  the 
area  of  selection  from  within.  Not  only  is  it  believed  that  the 
restrictive  regulations  thus  developed  at  the  instance  of  the 
Commission  have  in  many  cases  been  unnecessary,  but  also 
that  the  theory  which  has  been  responsible  for  the  Commis- 
sion's recommendations  under  this  head  is  an  incorrect  one.  In 
its  current  publication  dealing  with  this  subject,^  the  Com- 
mission repeats  the  statement  first  made  by  it  some  fifteen  years 
ago  as  follows : 

No  specific  authority  for  transfers  is  found  in  the  civil 
service  act,  and  they  are  allowed  only  as  necessary  exceptions 
to  open  competition.  The  rules  are  intended  to  impose  re- 
trictions  which  will  confine  transfers  within  the  fundamental 
provisions  of  the  act ;  that  is,  that  they  shall  be  warranted  by 
the  conditions  of  good  administration  and  have  regard  to  the 
rights  of  competitors  and  employees  without  making  a  privi- 
leged class  of  the  latter. 

To  agree  with  the  reasoning  of  the  Commission  in  this 
matter  is  indeed  difficult.  In  view  of  the  circumstances  under 
which  the  civil  service  act  was  passed  and  in  view  of  the  fact 
that  the  act  itself  specifically  recognizes  that  "other  things" 
may  be  included  in  the  rules  to  be  promulgated  by  the  Presi- 
dent, there  seems  to  be  little  reason  for  taking  the  position 
that  the  act  should  be  given  any  force  in  the  direction  of  re- 
stricting the  possibilities  of  transfer  beyond  what  would  be 

*  Information  concerning  transfers,  United  States  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission, Form  30b,  December,  1917. 


272  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

indicated  by  the  needs  of  sound  personnel  administration  if 
the  act  did  not  exist.  Again,  the  principle  of  having  "regard 
to  the  rights  of  competitors  and  employees  without  making 
a  privileged  class  of  the  latter"  finds  no  warrant  in  the  civil 
service  act  itself.  The  act,  indeed,  does  provide  that  all  posi- 
tions, "as  nearly  as  the  conditions  of  good  administration  will 
warrant,*'  shall  be  filled  by  open  competitive  examination;  but 
the  act  says  nothing  which  negatives  the  possibility  that  it  may 
be  very  much  in  the  interests  of  good  administration  to  make 
"a  privileged  class"  of  employees  in  certain  cases,  nor  does  the 
act  anywhere  define  or  indeed  even  mention  the  "rights  of  com- 
petitors." The  purpose  of  the  act  was  not  to  extend  any 
"rights"  to  competitors  for  entrance  to  the  service  but  to  pro- 
vide a  method  of  filling  vacancies  from  without  the  service 
when  it  became  necessary  to  fill  vacancies  in  that  way.  The 
act  cannot  thus  be  fairly  regarded  as  touching  in  any  way  on 
the  question  of  the  extent  to  which  it  might  be  desirable  to 
fill  vacancies  from  within,  rather  than  from  without,  the 
service. 

Equally  mistaken  seems  to  be  the  general  statement,  made 
by  the  Commission  in  explanation  of  a  restriction  on  freedom 
of  transfer  effected  by  amendment  to  the  rules  made  in  1904, 
that  "injustice  is  done  when  a  person  is  brought  into  a  depart- 
ment over  the  heads  of  those  deserving  promotion."  ^  Al- 
though this  statement  had  particular  reference  to  the  prohibi- 
tion of  transfers  to  a  position  above  the  lowest  grade  in  any 
class  except  upon  special  certificate,  it  may  be  taken  fairly  as 
representing  a  general  attitude  on  the  part  of  the  Commission 
on  the  question  of  the  proper  extent  of  the  area  of  selection 
from  within. 

The  difficulty  with  this  view  is  that  it  fails  to  look  at  the 
service  as  a  whole.  ,  It  adopts  the  provincial  outlook  of  the 
mediocre  employee  who  can  see  no  further  than  the  particular 
branch  of  the  service  in  which  he  happens  to  be  at  the  time. 
To  the  capable  and  ambitious  employee,  however,  it  seems  no 

'  Twenty-first  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1904),  p.  IS. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  273 

hardship  that  one  is  brought  from  another  branch  of  the  serv- 
ice over  his  head,  provided,  of  course,  his  selection  for  that 
purpose  has  been  fairly  and  honestly  made,  because  he  sees  in 
this  transfer  a  corresponding  opportunity  for  himself  to  seize 
an  opportunity  in  another  branch  of  the  service  when  it  arises. 

The  principle  here  contended  for  in  effect  converts  the 
whole  federal  service  into  a  single  system  within  which  free 
movement  obtains,  while  the  principle  contended  for  by  the 
Civil  Service  Commission  in  the  statements  quoted  looks  to 
the  maintenance  of  the  system  as  an  aggregate  of  closed  cir- 
cles with  a  transfer  from  one  to  the  other  possible  only  in 
the  rarest  instances.  The  net  effect  of  the  two  theories  would 
not  be  widely  divergent  were  all  the  circles  of  equal  dimen- 
sions, and  opportunity  for  promotion  within  each  of  them 
equally  frequent  and  attractive.  Since  such  is,  however,  in  no 
degree  the  case,  the  insistence  of  the  right  of  each  small  group 
of  employees  to  be  treated  as  a  service  apart  from  all  other 
groups  in  the  service  cannot  but  result  in  the  grossest  inequality 
of  opportunity  for  promotion  and  advancement  in  the  several 
branches  of  the  service  and  the  deterioration  in  the  caliber  of 
the  personnel  in  those  branches  of  the  service  in  which  oppor- 
tunity is  slight.  The  theory  here  contended  for  opens  up  to 
every  branch  of  the  service,  within  the  natural  limitations 
fixed  by  the  diversity  of  work,  the  material  available  anywhere 
in  the  service. 

At  still  another  point  the  principle  adopted  by  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  is  open  to  criticism.  In  concentrating  at- 
tention on  the  injustice  done  to  those  "deserving  of  promo- 
tion" by  bringing  in  one  from  another  branch  of  the  service 
over  their  heads,  no  account  is  taken  of  the  fact  that  that  one 
may  be  equally  or  more  "deserving"  at  the  hands  of  the  serv- 
ice. The  fact  of  the  matter  is  that  the  statement  of  the  Com- 
mission really  implies  that  the  selection  of  the  person  from 
another  branch  of  the  service  in  preference  to  those  within  that 
branch  is  not  made  solely  with  an  eye  to  the  good  of  the  service 
but  is  in  whole  or  in  part  dictated  by  the  purely  selfish  inter- 
ests of  the  individual  involved.     It  cannot  be  questioned  that 


274  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

under  current  conditions  prevailing  in  the  federal  service  many 
of  the  transfers  from  one  branch  of  the  service  to  another  have 
been  open  to  this  objection.  The  remedy,  however,  is  not  to 
oppose  obstacles  to  the  free  movement  of  the  personnel  from 
one  branch  to  another  but  to  establish  such  methods  of  selec- 
tion of  persons  to  be  transferred  from  one  branch  to  another 
as  will  insure  that  the  transfer,  in  every  case,  is  demanded  by 
the  interests  of  the  service. 

The  attitude  taken  by  the  Commission  in  this  matter  is  all 
the  more  remarkable  in  view  of  the  fact  that  it  has  never  of- 
fered the  slightest  objection  to  the  filling  of  a  post  by  open 
competition  which  could  satisfactorily  be  filled  by  promotion 
from  within  the  service.  Surely  if  injustice  is  done  to  those 
in  a  particular  branch  of  the  service  by  bringing  in  over  their 
heads  one  from  another  branch  of  the  service,  the  injustice 
must  be  all  the  greater  when  one  is  brought  in  over  the  heads 
from  wholly  outside  the  service. 

Attitude  of  Congress. — The  action  which  Congress  has 
taken  on  this  subject  is  also  wholly  innocent  of  any  construc- 
tive intent.  The  interest  of  Congress  in  this  matter  has  arisen 
at  various  times  from  the  competition  between  different  serv- 
ices and  de])artments  for  particular  classes  of  employees,  re- 
sulting in  one  service  or  department  outbidding  the  other. 
Obviously  this  condition  could  not  arise  were  there  enforced 
throughout  the  departments  and  services  a  uniform  standard 
classification  of  duties  and  appropriate  compensation  rates  ap- 
pertaining thereto.  In  the  absence  of  such  standards,  however, 
departments  naturally  have  been  able  to  offer  very  widely  vary- 
ing figures  for  the  same  type  of  service.  In  the  attempt  to 
prevent  this  competition  of  departments  with  one  another.  Con- 
gress has  enacted  several  restrictive  statutes  of  wide  applica- 
tion. The  particular  terms  of  these  statutes  and  their  inap- 
propriateness  for  meeting  the  situation  in  question  are  dis- 
cussed in  the  subsequent  paragraphs  in  connection  with  the 
several  types  of  restrictions.  Here  it  is  desired  merely  to 
point  out  that  the  action  of  Congress  on  this  point  has  been 
brought  about  only  by  a  wrong  condition  for  which  Congress 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  275 

alone  is  responsible.  Had  Congress  provided  a  means  whereby 
uniform  rates  might  be  fixed  for  the  same  class  of  work 
throughout  all  branches  of  the  service  and  enforced  an  impar- 
tial application  of  those  rates,  it  would  be  impossible  for  any 
employee  to  obtain  a  higher  rate  simply  by  moving  from  one 
organization  unit  of  the  service  to  another,  while  the  work 
which  he  was  performing  remained  the  same.  Were  the  work 
to  be  really  higher  in  grade,  there  should  be  no  proper  ob- 
jection, of  course,  to  the  change.  It  should  be  welcomed,  in 
fact. 

Disadvantages  of  Existing  Restrictions  upon  Transfers. 
— The  restrictions  which  are  in  force  upon  transfer  from  one 
department  to  another  reveal  themselves  as  especially  perni- 
cious when  a  new  service  or  agency  is  established.  Little  is 
to  be  looked  for  in  the  way  of  a  multiplication  of  opportuni- 
ties within  a  given  service  by  reason  of  its  own  rapid  expan- 
sion. Not  infrequently,  however,  the  government  enters  an 
entirely  new  field  of  activity,  and  constructs  a  large  new  or- 
ganization therefor.  In  such  a  case,  opportunity  is  offered 
to  build  the  personnel  of  the  new  service  by  selection  from 
the  ranks  of  the  existing  organization.  In  view  of  the  nat- 
ural limitations  on  the  opportunity  for  advancement  in  the 
federal  service,  it  would  seem  clear  that  such  an  occasion  for 
increasing  those  opportunities  should  be  welcomed  and  should 
be  availed  of  to  the  fullest  possible  extent.  From  the  stand- 
point of  the  new  organization,  the  desirability  of  obtaining 
an  administrative  personnel  familiar  with  government  methods 
is  equally  clear.  But  the  statutory  restrictions  now  in  force 
make  no  distinction  whatever  between  such  a  case  as  this 
one  and  that  of  transfer  to  a  well  established  branch  of  the 
service. 

These  restrictions  apply  only  where  the  position  to  which 
transfer  is  sought  is  in  the  competitive  class.  Where  the  posi- 
tion is  excepted  from  examination,  whether  by  statute  or  by 
the  rules,  the  appointing  officer  is  free  to  fill  it  by  the  selection 
of  whomever  he  wishes,  so  that  manifestly  no  special  restric- 
tion could  logically  exist  which  would  in  any  way  hinder  him 


276  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

from  filling  it  by  the  selection  of  one  already  in  the  service.^ 
The  requirements  now  in  force,  whether  derived  from 
statute  or  civil  service  rule,  virtually  without  exception,  are 
applicable  only  to  transfers  from  one  department  or  inde- 
pendent establishment  to  another.  In  theory,  there  is  no  rea- 
son why,  even  were  the  departmental  organization  of  the  gov- 
ernment wholly  correct  and  consistent,  a  transfer  from  one 
department  to  another  should  be  made  any  more  difficult  than 
one  from  one  branch  of  a  department  to  another.  In  either 
case,  the  transfer  should  be  made,  under  proper  practice,  only 
where  the  employee  transferred  meets  the  requirements  of  the 
position  to  which  he  is  transferred  more  completely  than  does 
any  employee  more  nearly  adjacent  to  the  organization  unit 
in  which  the  vacancy  occurs,  or  where  the  transfer  represents 
to  him  an  advancement  in  compensation,  responsibility,  or  op- 
portunity which  he  has  earned  more  fully  than  such  more  ad- 
jacent employee.  If  either  or  both  these  factors  are  present, 
it  would  seem  immaterial  whether  the  transfer  involves  a 
journey  from  one  department  to  another  or  merely  from  one 
part  of  a  department  to  another. - 

Especially  w^ould  this  view  seem  to  apply  considering  the 

^If  the  position  to  which  transfer  is  sought  be  in  the  competitive 
class  and  the  position  from  which  the  transfer  is  proposed  be  an  ex- 
cepted one,  the  person  proposed  to  be  transferred  must  pass  an  examina- 
tion.    This  requirement  is  discussed  in  the   following  section. 

*The  following  from  the  report  of  the  Reclassification  Commission 
(Part  I,  p.  12)  seems  to  endorse  tiiis  view:  "We  are  asking  the  Congress 
to  remove  the  barriers  which  have  been  set  up  between  the  various  depart- 
ments and  which  have  made  it  extremelj'  difficult  for  an  employee  in  one 
department  to  secure  a  more  lucrative  place  in  another  department. 
We  believe  the  service  should  be  regarded  as  an  entity  and  that  pro- 
motions should  go  to  the  best  qualified  without  regard  to  departmental 
lines." 

It  is  not  entirely  clear,  however,  how  this  is  to  be  reconciled  with 
the  position  taken  at  a  subsequent  point  in  the  report  (p.  127)  that  "a 
clear  distinction  should  be  made  between  transfer  between  departments 
and  assignment  to  specific  positions  within  the  same  department.  The 
Civil  Service  Commission  should  have  no  authority  over  assignments, 
provided  they  are  in  accordance  with  the  classification,  the  placing  of 
individuals  in  specific  positions  within  the  same  class  coming  entirely 
within  the  jurisdiction  of  the  administrative  officers  in  charge  of  the 
work."  If  it  be  assumed  that  the  word  department  is  here  used  in  the 
sense  of  organization  unit,  the  inconsistency  disappears,  as  the  sentence 
would  then  mean  merely  that  the  Commission  would  not  exercise  su- 
pervision over  the  division  of  labor  among  the  employees  of  a  class  in 
any  organization  unit. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  277 

existing  departmental  organization  of  the  federal  government. 
The  present  distribution  of  functions  and  services  among  the 
departments  represents  not  the  outworking  of  a  comprehensive 
and  consistent  plan,  but  a  more  or  less  haphazard  and  acci- 
dental growth,  characterized  by  many  features  wholly  illogical, 
some  very  ill-considered,  and  not  a  few  manifestly  absurd. 
In  a  number  of  instances,  the  gap  which  separates  a  given 
service  from  another  in  the  same  department  is  far  wider  than 
that  which  separates  it  from  a  given  service  in  another  depart- 
ment. In  fact,  it  is  notorious  that  nearly  all  the  proposals 
which  from  time  to  time  have  been  put  forward  for  the  con- 
solidation of  functions  in  the  federal  government  have  con- 
templated the  consolidation  of  two  or  more  services  not  in  the 
same  department  but  in  different  departments.  Obviously, 
this  lack  of  logic  in  the  departmental  organization  of  the  gov- 
ernment renders  all  the  more  improper  and  vexatious  the  ar- 
bitrary restrictions  which  are  interposed  to  hinder  free  move- 
ment from  one  department  to  another. 

The  basic  motive  for  these  restrictions  has  been  to  check 
the  employees  in  their  attempts  to  obtain  higher  salaries  by  se- 
curing transfers  from  departments  paying  lower  salaries  to 
those  paying  higher  salaries  for  the  same  class  of  work.  The 
situation  which  led  to  their  enactment  was  thus  summarized  in 
the  report  of  the  Quartermaster  General  for  the  year  ended 
June  30,  1904 ;! 

Under  the  provisions  of  the  civil  service  rules  relating  to 
transfers,  during  the  past  year  other  Departments  have  ap- 
plied for  and  obtained  the  transfer  from  this  Office  of  a  num- 
ber of  clerks — with  hardly  an  exception  .  .  .  young  men  who, 
in  addition  to  being  competent  clerks,  are  skilled  stenogra- 
phers and  typewriters,  and  who  at  the  time  of  their  respective 
transfers  had  been  in  the  service  just  long  enough  to  familiar- 
ize themselves  with  departmental  methods.  However  valuable 
the  system  of  transfers  may  be  to  the  Departments  drafting 
this  class  of  employees,  it  is  demoralizing  to  the  Department 
from  which  the  clerks  are  drafted.     It  is  true  that  the  latter 

*  Twenty-first  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1904),  p.  15. 


278  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Department  can,  under  the  rules,  arbitrarily  refuse  to  grant 
the  requested  transfer,  but  in  every  case  the  clerk  whose  trans- 
fer is  asked  is  offered  an  increase  in  salary  .  .  .  and  in  the 
majority  of  cases  more  rapid  promotion  than  can  be  expected 
in  the  office  in  which  he  is  serving.  When  these  facts  are 
placed  before  the  head  of  a  Department,  he  approves  the  trans- 
fer rather  than  take  the  position  of  standing  in  the  way  of  the 
material  advancement  of  the  clerk. 

The  difficulty  with  this  proposition  is  that  the  condition 
out  of  which  the  undue  frequency  of  transfer  arose,  that  is, 
the  lack  of  uniformity  in  the  salaries  paid  for  the  same  kind 
of  work  in  the  several  departments,  was  an  improper  one  and 
one  capable  of  being  remedied.  The  undue  frequency  of  trans- 
fers was  merely  a  symptom  of  this  disease  and  not  a  disease 
itself.  The  remedy  should  have  been  sought  in  a  standardiza- 
tion of  salary  rates  for  similar  classes  of  work  throughout  the 
departments  and  not  in  an  arbitrary  restriction  upon  the  free- 
dom of  transfer  in  cases  where  such  transfer  might  be  desired 
not  merely  by  the  employee  for  personal  reasons  but  by  the 
administration  officers  of  both  departments  concerned  for  rea- 
sons solely  connected  with  the  good  of  the  service. 

The  most  important  restriction  now  in  force  limiting  trans- 
fer from  one  department  to  another  is  that  requiring  that  an 
employee  "must  have  served  for  a  term  of  three  years  in  an 
executive  department  or  independent  establishment  at  Wash- 
ington before  transfer  to  another  such  department  or  estab- 
lishment." This  rule  is  merely  a  paraphrase  of  a  statute 
originally  enacted  in  1906  ^  and  extended  in  its  scope  in 
1917.2 

The  drastic  character  of  this  provision  needs  no  comment. 

*  Act  of  June  22,  1906,  34  Stat.  449. 

'  Act  of  October  6,  1917,  40  Stat.  383.  The  original  act  of  1906  ap- 
plied only  to  transfers  from  one  executive  department  to  another  execu- 
tive department.  The  act  of  1917  extended  the  restriction  to  transfers 
from  executive  departments  to  independent  establishments  and  vice  versa 
and  to  transfers  of  employees  from  one  independent  establishment  to  an- 
other. Long  before  the  statutory  extension  of  1917,  the  rules  (under 
an  amendment  ordered  September  23,  1907)  had  extended  the  three-year 
requirement  to  transfers  between,  to,  or  from  independent  establishments; 
but  under  those  rules  the  requirement  might  be  waived  by  the  Commis- 
sion, while  the  statute  made  it  mandatory. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  279 

Taken  in  conjunction  with  the  act  of  191 7,  shortly  to  be  men- 
tioned, which  prohibits  the  appointment  of  persons  under  lump 
sum  appropriations  in  any  department  at  a  higher  rate  of  com- 
pensation than  was  received  by  them  in  any  other  department 
preceding  their  employment  by  the  second  department,  it  con- 
stitutes a  more  drastic  restriction  upon  inter-departmental 
transfers  than  is  to  be  found  in  any  other  public  personnel  sys- 
tem that  has  come  to  notice  and  one  which,  needless  to  say, 
is  wholly  foreign  to  the  practice  of  private  personnel  systems. 
It  is  consequently  all  the  more  difficult  to  understand  why 
the  Commission  felt  called  upon,  in  1907,  to  extend  this  three- 
year  requirement  even  further  than  required  by  the  statute. 
The  Attorney  General  ruled,  shortly  after  the  enactment  of 
this  statute,  that  it  did  not  apply  to  transfers  to  or  from  the 
field  services  of  the  several  departments,  on  the  ground  that 
the  term  "departments"  as  used  in  the  act  was  intended  to 
apply  only  to  the  departments  at  Washington.^  The  President 
presumably  acting  on  the  recommendation  of  the  Commission, 
shortly  thereafter  amended  the  rules  to  apply  the  same  restric- 
tion to  inter-departmental  transfers  to  or  from  field  services, 
with  the  qualification  that  the  requirement  may  be^  waived 
upon  a  statement  of  reasons  satisfying  the  Commission  that 
a  transfer  is  necessary  in  the  interest  of  the  service.^  In- 
formation is  not  available  as  to  the  frequency  with  which 
occasions  arise  for  the  application  of  this  part  of  the  rule, 
or  as  to  the  attitude  which  the  Commission  has  taken  towards 
applications  for  the  waiving  of  the  requirement.  Whatever 
may  be  the  facts  on  this  head,  however,  it  is  believed  that  the 
rule  itself  is  uncalled  for  and  unsound  in  principle,  and  should 
be  abrogated  without  delay;  and  that  the  Commission  at  the 
same  time  should  urge  upon  Congress  the  repeal  of  the  statutes 
of  1906  and  1917. 

^Opinion  of  the  Attorney  General,  May   17,   1907,  26  Op.,  254. 

'Amendment  of  September  23,  1907,  to  Rule  X,  8  (a).  In  point  of 
fact  the  amendment,  in  its  terms,  requires  the  consent  of  the  Commission 
to  the  waiving  of  the  three-year  requirement  not  merely  in  the  case  of 
inter-departmental  transfers  to  or  from  field  services,  but  even  in  all 
inter-departmental  transfers.  If  this  was  the  intent  of  the  rule,  how- 
ever, it  has  never  been  carried  out. 


28o  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Official  opinion,  based  on  experience,  accords  with  theory 
in  recommending  this  course.  In  the  year  following  the  en- 
actment of  the  three-year  law  the  following  comment  was  made 
by  the  Secretary  of  Commerce  and  Labor: 

The  law  prohibiting  transfers  from  one  Executive  Depart- 
ment to  another  until  three  years'  service  has  not  worked  an 
improvement.  The  bright  young  man  coming  into  the  service 
at  a  small  salary  is  largely  influenced  in  his  acceptance  of  the 
place  by  the  hope  of  reasonably  early  promotion.  In  many 
offices  he  finds  that  there  is  but  little  opportunity.  He  cannot 
afford  to  wait  three  years  for  a  transfer  to  some  office  where 
the  chances  are  better,  and  he  either  leaves  the  service  at  the 
beginning  of  his  usefulness  or  drifts  into  hopeless  mediocrity. 
While  it  is  probably  true  that  some  offices  and  Departments 
have  suffered  because  of  frequent  transfers,  it  is  believed  that 
the  proper  remedy  is  a  uniform  reclassification  of  the  service, 
as  recently  recommended  by  the  Committee  on  Department 
Methods,  and  that  any  direct  prohibition  against  transfers  be- 
yond the  period  of  six  months  originally  fixed  by  the  civil 
service  rules,  while  affording  apparent  relief,  does  not  remove 
the  cause  and  cannot  be  regarded  as  the  correct  solution  of 
the  difficulty.  The  nucleus  of  this  Department  was  formed 
by  transfers  from  other  branches  of  the  service,  and  it  would 
probably  have  been  a  severe  drawback  had  the  transfer  limi- 
tation then  been  in  effect.  Were  all  the  Departments  classi- 
fied on  a  uniform  basis,  much,  if  not  all,  of  the  instability  of 
the  force  in  certain  Departments  and  offices  would  disappear.^ 

Again  in  1910,  the  Secretary  of  Commerce  and  Labor  ex- 
pressed his  opinion  of  the  three-year  rule  as  highly  undesir- 
able from  the  standpoint  of  personnel  administration.  The 
statement  made  by  him  at  that  time,  and  presumably  prepared 
for  him  by  an  official  in  his  Department  thoroughly  conversant 
with  conditions  in  the  Federal  Service,  so  admirably  sums  up 
the  considerations  bearing  on  this  question  as  to  warrant  re- 
production in  full. 

There  are  many  instances  in  which  it  is  found  to  be  im- 
practicable to  make  selections  for  appointment  from  the  civil 

^Twenty-fourth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion  (1907),  p.  176. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  281 

service  registers.  Prior  to  June  22,  1906,  a  department  could 
select,  after  six  months'  service,  an  employee  in  another  de- 
partment or  branch  of  the  service  having  qualifications  to  fit 
the  needs  of  a  particular  position,  thus  leaving  a  vacancy  which 
very  often  could  be  filled  advantageously  from  the  eligible  list, 
but  by  legislation  enacted  on  that  date  such  a  transfer  is  pro- 
hibited if  both  positions  are  in  Washington,  D.  C,  unless  the 
employee  proposed  for  transfer  has  served  at  least  three  years 
in  the  department  from  which  transfer  is  desired.  This  ap- 
plies also  to  transfers  to  and  from  positions  outside  of  the 
District  of  Columbia,  unless  the  Civil  Service  Commission 
deems  the  action  necessary  in  the  interest  of  the  service  and 
waives  the  three-year  requirement.  That  transfers,  especially 
to  positions  requiring  executive  ability  or  scientific  and  tech- 
nical training,  are  occasionally  desirable  and  even  necessary 
to  the  best  interests  of  the  Government  cannot  be  questioned. 
The  transfer  of  an  employee  from  a  position  not  requiring 
the  full  use  of  his  powers  to  one  requiring  a  higher  order  of 
efficiency  also  is  clearly  not  only  in  the  interest  of  the  service, 
but  advantageous  to  the  employee  himself.  It  enables  a  de- 
partment to  fill  properly  a  position  which  requires  a  special 
order  of  ability  or  imposes  a  high  degree  of  responsibility 
by  the  appointment  of  a  person  whom  experience  has  shown  to 
possess  just  the  cjualifications  of  mind  and  temperament  de- 
sired, as  wtII  as  to  retain  in  the  service  a  valuable  employee 
who  might  otherwise  become  dissatisfied  wath  his  environ- 
ments and  leave  the  service,  but  who,  if  given  the  proper  en- 
couragement and  opportunity,  might  rise  step  by  step  into  the 
higher  positions.  A  less  direct,  but  by  no  means  unimpor- 
tant, advantage  of  the  privilege  of  transfer  is  that  it  offers 
inducements  to  ambitious  young  men  who  would  enter  the 
service  if  they  felt  assured  of  a  fair  chance  for  advancement. 
The  civil  service  act  contains  no  specific  authority  for  trans- 
fers. Presumably  for  this  reason  the  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion considers  the  filling  of  a  position  by  transfer  such  a  de- 
parture from  the  general  method  of  appointment  prescribed 
by  law  as  can  only  be  justified  when  the  conditions  of  good 
administration  will  be  more  fully  met  than  by  original  ap- 
pointment. Apparently  also  the  commission  recognized  the 
advantages  of  a  certain  amount  of  elasticity  in  the  transfer 
rules,  for  it  stated,  shortly  before  the  passage  of  the  law  es- 
tablishing the  three-year  limit,  that  it  l3elieved  that  transfers 
had  been  restricted  to  the  fullest  extent  compatible  with  the 
best  interests  of  the  service. 


282  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Experience  shows  that  inter-departmental  transfers  are  per- 
haps unnecessarily  hampered  and  restricted  at  the  present  time 
by  the  provision  of  law  referred  to.  While  its  object  was, 
unquestionably,  to  restrict  the  number  of  transfers  made  for 
personal  and  other  reasons  not  connected  with  the  best  inter- 
ests of  the  service,  and  to  prevent  persons  from  accepting 
appointments  to  undesirable  positions  with  a  view  to  securing 
early  transfer  through  improper  influence,  in  actual  practice 
it  appears  to  be  merely  an  arbitrary  rule  for  which  no  suffi- 
cient reason  can  be  found,  and  an  obstacle  in  the  way  of  busi- 
nesslike methods.  It  is  not  apparent  why  objectionable  trans- 
fers could  not  be  restricted  by  means  less  detrimental  to  the 
general  service;  why,  if  a  time  limit  is  deemed  absolutely 
necessary,  it  should  Ije  placed  at  three  years  rather  than  at  six 
months  or  one  year;  or  why  the  Civil  Service  Commission 
should  not  be  authorized  to  waive  the  requirement,  even  in 
transfers  between  departments  in  Washington,  when  the  head 
of  a  department  concludes  and  certifies  that  such  action  is  re- 
quired in  the  interest  of  the  service.  In  pleasing  contrast  to 
inter-departmental  transfers,  and  as  really  convincing  illustra- 
tions of  their  usefulness  with  proper  cooperation  between  the 
departments  and  fewer  arbitrary  restrictions,  are  the  transfers 
between  the  various  bureaus  of  this  department.  During  the 
past  fiscal  year  there  were  90  transfers  of  this  kind.  Many 
of  these  were  made  upon  the  application  of  the  employee  con- 
cerned; practically  all  were  agreeable  to  the  persons  trans- 
ferred; and  all  (even  those  made  as  the  result  of  the  efficiency 
records  taken  last  year)  had  in  view  the  ultimate  good  of  the 
service.^ 

There  is  not  found  in  any  subsequent  pronouncement  of 
the  Civil  Service  Commission  or  of  the  departments  any  dis- 
cussion of  ':he  wisdom  of  the  three-year  transfer  rule,  but  it 
it  is  hardly  to  be  doubted  that  a  canvass  of  the  officers  of  the 
several  departments  and  bureaus  which  have  to  do  with  per- 
sonnel matters  would  disclose  a  fairly  unanimous  agreement 
among  them  that  the  present  requirement  is  distinctly  hurtful 
to  the  service.^ 

'  Twenty-seventh  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion  (1910),  p.  139. 

'In  1912  the  President's  Commission  on  Economy  and  Ffficiency 
addressed  to  all  the  principal  administrative  officers  in  Washington  a 
questionnaire  calling  for  comment  on  various  statutory  provisions  affect- 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  283 

Unduly  restrictive  as  the  three-year  requirement  is,  it 
proved  itself  wholly  ineffective,  in  the  complete  absence  of  cen- 
tral provision  for  salary  fixation  and  enforcement,  to  check 
the  wholesale  inter-departmental  competition  for  experienced 
employees,  and  even  for  inexperienced,  which  developed 
promptly  upon  the  declaration  of  war.  Congress  again  met 
the  situation,  not  with  any  fundamental  plan  for  the  central 
control  and  equalization  of  compensation  rates,  but  with  a 
wholly  negative,  restrictive  enactment.  At  a  time  when  it  was 
of  vital  import  to  the  government  that  every  experienced  em- 
ployee should  be  placed  in  that  branch  of  the  hastily  improvised 
and  hourly  expanding  war  organization  for  which  he  was  best 
fitted,  Congress  prohibited  the  transfer  of  any  employee  from 
one  department  to  another  at  an  increased  rate  of  compensa- 
tion (or  the  employment  at  a  higher  rate  of  any  person  who 
had  within  the  year  been  employed  in  another  department,  a 
provision  obviously  designed  to  prevent  evasion  through  res- 
ignation and  reappointment)  ;  and  forbade  any  increase  of  the 
compensation  of  any  employee  transferred  within  a  year  after 
the  transfer.^  The  Comptroller  of  the  Treasury  fortunately 
decided  that  the  act  was  limited  to  positions  in  the  depart- 
ments and  independent  establishments  at  Washington,^ 
Adopted  purely  as  an  emergency  measure,  and  embodied  in 
an  appropriation  act,  this  ill-advised  measure  still  remains  on 
the  statute  books,  chiefly  because  Congress  is  too  much  occu- 
pied with  other  matters  to  repeal  it.^ 

In  connection  with  this  legislation,  mention  should  be  made 
of  the  act  of  1912  prohibiting  the  increasing  of  an  employee's 

ing  personnel.  The  replies  (to  be  found  in  "A  Budget  for  the  Fiscal 
Year  1914,"  one  of  the  Commission's  Reports,  pp.  207-335)  in  most  cases 
mention  the  three-year  statutory  restriction  on  transfers  and  virtually 
unanimously  condemn  it. 

'Act  of  October  6,  1917,  40  Stat.  384.  It  should  be  noted  that  the 
act  in  terms  applies  only  to  salaries  paid  out  of  lump  sum  appropria- 
tions;  but  this  represents  far  the  larger,  and  an  ever  increasing,  pro- 
portion of  positions. 

^Decision  of  October  12,  1917,  24  Dec.  Compt.  207. 

^The  case  against  the  statute  is  conclusively  and  fully  set  forth  in  a 
report  of  the  House  Committee  on  Reform  in  the  Civil  Service,  made 
August  8,  1918,  recommending  its  repeal.  Sixty-sixth  Congress,  ist  Ses- 
sion, House  Report  No.  272.  See  also  Congressional  Record  April  I, 
1920,  p.  5492. 


284  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

salary  by  shifting  him  from  a  statutory  position  to  one  paid 
out  of  a  kimp  sum  appropriation.^  This  act  was  not  directed 
primarily  against  inter-departmental  transfers  but  rather 
against  abuses  of  the  lump  appropriations  to  make  unwar- 
ranted increases  of  salary  within  the  departments.  It  applies, 
however,  as  against  inter-departmental  transfers  as  well. 

Attitude  of  RcclassificatIo)i  Commission . — Discussing  the 
several  restrictions  on  inter-departmental  transfers  in  relation 
to  compensation  rates  just  reviewed,  the  Reclassification  Com- 
mission well  says : 

Such  restrictions,  however  good  their  intent,  render  trans- 
fers exceedingly  difficult  and  tend  to  make  the  entire  service 
immobile.  During  the  last  few  years  in  particular  they  have 
worked  a  real  hardship  by  preventing  the  more  experienced 
and  efficient  employees  from  being  transferred  to  other  or- 
ganizations where  salaries  were  higher  or  opportunities  for 
advancement  better,  Whatever  justification  may  have  existed 
for  restrictions  of  this  sort  in  the  past  will  be  done  away  with 
in  the  future  under  the  new  classification.  Providing  similar 
pay  for  the  performance  of  similar  duties  throughout  the 
service  will  do  away  with  the  temptation  that  now  exists  for 
one  department  to  bid  against  another,  and  will  tend  to  limit 
the  desire  of  the  employees  to  be  transferred  to  cases  wdiere 
there  is  some  real  reason  for  a  change  aside  from  the  prospect 
of  salary  increase. 

Under  these  conditions  the  Commission  sees  no  danger  in 
the  removal  of  the  present  restrictions  on  transfers.  On  the 
contrary,  it  believed  that  such  action  would  prove  beneficial  by 
increasing  the  mobility  of  the  service  and  making  possible  the 
placing  of  employees  where  they  can  serve  to  the  best  ad- 
vantage. General  supervision  over  inter-departmental  trans- 
fers would  naturally  be  exercised  by  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission under  such  rules  and  regulations  as  that  Commission 
might  prescribe.  With  the  safeguards  against  abuse  provided 
by  the  new  classification  and  by  the  activities  of  the  Civil 
Service  Commission's  representatives,  it  is  believed  that  these 
rules  might  well  provide  that  the  initiative  in  a  transfer  could 
be  taken  by  the  employee  concerned  as  well  as  by  the  head  of 
the  department  to  which  the  transfer  is  to  be  made.     The  ap- 

*  Act  of  August  26,  1912,  37  Stat.  626,  as  amended  by  act  of  March  4, 
1913,  37  Stat.  ygo. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  285 

proval  of  the  latter  would,  of  course,  be  a  prerequisite  in  all 
cases  to  favorable  action  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission ;  and 
the  disapproval  of  the  head  of  the  department  from  which 
transfer  is  to  be  made  should  serve  as  a  temporary  bar  to 
transfer,  subject  to  appeal  and  final  decision  by  the  Civil  Serv- 
ice Commission.^ 

One  further  restriction  on  inter-departmental  transfers,  of 
a  comparatively  minor  character,  should  be  mentioned — that 
providing  that  "no  transfer  shall  be  made  to  a  competitive 
position  above  the  lowest  class  in  any  grade  unless  the  ap- 
pointing officer  shall  certify  that  the  position  cannot  be  ade- 
quately filled  by  promotion."  (Rule  X,  Section  i.)  ^  This 
rule  was  promulgated  by  an  amendment  of  1904.  The  reason 
for  this  amendment  as  stated  by  the  Commission  was  that  "in- 
justice is  done  when  a  person  is  brought  into  a  department 
over  the  heads  of  those  deserving  promotion."  ^ 

This  view,  as  already  pointed  out,  does  not  take  into  ac- 
count the  fact  that  while  those  in  the  department  may  indeed 
be  "deserving  of  promotion,"  there  may  often  be  in  another 
department  one  equally  or  more  "deserving,"  whose  transfer, 
moreover,  is  demanded  by  the  needs  of  the  service.  Occasions 
may  arise  in  which  a  position  can  satisfactorily  be  filled  by  pro- 
motion but  it  is  nevertheless  desirable  to  fill  it  by  the  transfer 
of  a  person  who  is  either  specially  suitable  or  for  whom  pro- 
vision must  in  fairness  be  made  because  of  conditions  ex- 
isting in  the  branch  from  which  he  is  transferred.  The  rule 
should  require  merely  that  the  Commission  should  be  satis- 
fied in  each  instance  that  the  interests  of  the  service  will  be 
subserved  by  filling  the  position  by  transfer  rather  than  by 
promotion.  Owing,  however,  to  the  absence  of  clearly  de- 
fined grades  over  the  major  part  of  the  service,  and  the  fact 
that  merely  the  certificate  of  the  appointing  officer,  but  no 

*  Report  of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  Part  I,  p.  126. 

'The  rule  further  provides  that  "The  Commission  may,  with  the 
approval  of  the  head  of  any  department,  adopt  regulations  applicable 
to  the  service  in  or  under  such  department  declaring  what  class  shair  be 
regarded  as  the  lowest  in  any  grade." 

'Twenty-first  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1904),  p.  15. 


286  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

proof  before  the  Commission,  is  required  to  effect  the  waiving 
of  this  rule,  it  is  not  of  any  serious  consequence  as  a  restric- 
tion upon  transfer. 

The  Reclassification  Commission  has  taken  a  view  on  this 
point  diametrically  opposed  to  that  taken  by  the  Civil  Service 
Commission.  It  has  recommended  that  every  vacancy  in  a 
higher  grade  be  filled  by  transfer  if  possible;  and  that  promo- 
tion be  made  only  when  there  is  no  employee  available  for 
transfer.^  While  this  proposal  is  doubtless  in  full  accord  with 
the  theory  of  the  extension  of  the  area  of  selection  from  within 
urged  in  the  foregoing  pages,  it  is  believed  to  go  beyond  the 
limits  of  practicability.  To  require  an  examination  to  be 
made  in  each  case  of  the  whole  service  for  employees  pos- 
sibly available  for  transfer  would  seem  an  unnecessary  labor. 
If  the  normal  areas  of  selection  from  within  are  properly 
defined,  it  will  be  sufficient  if  special  occasions  calling  for 
selection  from  without  that  area  are  brought  to  the  attention 
of  the  appointing  officer  on  the  initiative  of  the  Civil  Service 
Commission  in  each  individual  case. 

Absentee  of  Means  for  Locating  Eligihles  for  Transfer. — 
Another  factor  limiting  the  area  of  the  service  from  which 
selection  is  made,  is  the  absence  of  any  adequate  machinery  for 
bringing  before  the  appointment  officer  information  regarding 
the  material  available  in  the  area  outside  his  personal  cog- 
nizance. At  the  present  time  there  exists  no  special  machinery 
or  procedure  in  the  federal  service  for  bringing  the  job  and 
the  man  together  in  such  a  case.  If  news  of  the  vacancy  hap- 
pens to  come  to  the  attention  of  a  qualified  person  in  the 
service,  he  may  make  application  for  a  transfer,  which  will 
be  granted  on  his  securing  the  consent  of  the  heads  of  both 
departments  involved;  but  no  official  means  or  procedure  ex- 
ists for  bringing  the  job  to  his  attention,  or  for  raising  the 
question  of  transfer  without  his  being  compelled  to  take  the 
initiative.  No  attempt  is  made,  in  advance  of  ordering  an 
open  competitive  examination,  to  locate  a  possibly  suitable  per- 
son already  in  the  service  and  bring  about  his  transfer.     The 

*  Report  of  Reclassification  Commission,  Part  I,  pp.  24,  138. 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  287 

result  is  that  every  year  large  numbers  of  technical  or  quasi- 
technical  positions  are  filled  by  appointment  of  persons  from 
without  the  service  which  could  as  satisfactorily  be  filled  from 
within  the  service,  not  only  with  less  expense  and  delay  but,  far 
more  important,  with  a  resulting  stimulation  of  ambition  and 
enlargement  of  opportunity  for  the  whole  personnel — of  first 
importance  in  improving  morale  and  in  improving  also  the 
caliber  of  the  personnel  that  is  attracted  to  and  retained  in  the 
service. 

This  condition,  which  applies  principally  to  the  higher  cler- 
ical, office  manager,  type  of  position,  and  to  statistical  and 
routine  scientific  work,  could  be  readily  and  radically  improved 
were  the  Civil  Service  Commission  to  develop  such  records  as 
would  enable  it,  when  a  vacancy  arose  in  any  service  which 
could  not  to  advantage  be  filled  by  promotion  from  within  that 
service,  to  recommend  for  transfer  to  the  vacancy  one  or  more 
persons  already  in  the  service,  to  whom  appointment  to  the 
vacancy  would  represent  an  advance  in  salary  or  responsibility. 

A  special  phase  of  the  work  of  the  central  personnel  agency 
in  the  control  of  transfers  is  the  shifting  of  subordinate  per- 
sonnel from  department  to  department  to  meet  the  varying 
seasonal  needs  of  the  several  departments.  Exact  data  as  to 
the  possibilities  of  this  feature  of  the  federal  service  are  not 
available,  but  it  is  more  than  likely  that  there  are  substantial 
possibilities  for  good. 

Advantages  of  Recruiting  Personnel  at  Washington  from 
the  Field  Service. — A  practice  which  does  not  appear  to 
be  in  effect  in  any  of  the  Government  establishments  to  which 
it  would  be  applicable,  but  which  would  seem  to  offer  many 
advantages,  would  be  that  of  recruiting  the  personnel  at  Wash- 
ington, so  far  as  practicable,  not  from  outside  the  service,  but 
from  the  personnel  of  the  field  establishments.  Such  a  prac- 
tice, of  course,  would  be  most  readily  applicable  to  those  serv- 
ices which  have  comparatively  large  field  establishments  and 
comparatively  small  forces  at  Washington,  but  if  applied  on 
a  departmental  basis,  or,  as  would  be  practicable,  even  on  an 
inter-departmental  basis,  it  could  be  made  applicable  in  greater 


288  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

or  less  degree  to  the  recruitment  of  possibly  a  major  part  of 
the  personnel  at  Washington, 

The  advantages  of  such  a  system  lie  in  several  directions. 
In  the  first  place,  especially  if  appointments  to  Washington 
were  regarded  rather  in  the  nature  of  a  detail  for  a  term  than 
in  the  nature  of  a  permanent  appointment,  it  would  result  in 
a  continuous  interchange  of  personnel  between  the  field  es- 
tablishments and  the  departmental  offices  in  Washington.  An 
interchange  of  this  kind  is  w'ell  recognized  in  large  commercial 
and  industrial  organizations  as  in  the  highest  degree  beneficial. 
Where  no  such  interchange  of  personnel  obtains,  it  is  almost 
invariably  the  case  that  the  central  office  personnel  fails  prop- 
erly to  appreciate  the  conditions  and  the  difficulties  under 
which  the  field  personnel  works  and  that,  conversely,  the  field 
personnel  tends  to  be  impatient  of  the  requirements  laid  down 
by  the  central  office  with  respect  to  the  accounting,  reporting, 
and  related  matters,  the  importance  of  w^hich,  for  the  pur- 
pose of  central  control  is  not  clearly  apparent  to  those  in  the 
field.  Hence  it  is  that  prompt  and  willing  cooperation  be- 
tween field  and  central  establishments,  one  of  the  prime  requi- 
sites of  effective  administration,  is  greatly  facilitated  by  the 
practice  of   interchange  of  personnel  here  suggested. 

Another  advantage  to  which  passing  reference  has  been 
made  already  arises  from  the  fact  that  the  present  system  of 
selecting  the  personnel  for  the  departmental  service  at  Wash- 
ington from  the  w'hole  area  of  the  country,  as  it  necessarily 
does,  frequently  requires  the  appointing  officer  to  select  an 
eligible  who  resides  at  a  considerable  distance  from  Washing- 
ton only  to  find  long  before  the  expiration  of  the  probationary 
period  that  the  appointee  is  unsuited  for  the  work.  The  ob- 
vious difficulty  in  dismissing  an  employee  under  these  condi- 
tions, at  or  before  the  end  of  the  probationary  period,  not  in- 
frequently results  in  the  retention  of  the  incompetent  or  un- 
suitable employee  beyond  that  period,  which  is  equivalent  to 
indefinite  retention  in  the  service.  Under  the  system  proposed, 
on  the  other  hand,  the  appointing  officer  in  Washington  would 
not  be  compelled  to  select  more  or  less  blindly  but  would  ob- 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  289 

tain  his  personnel  by  selection  from  among  the  tried  and  tested 
employees  of  the  field  service  who  have  been  recommended  by 
local  superiors,  familiar  both  with  the  work  required  at  Wash- 
ington and  with  the  qualifications  of  the  individual  employee. 
Moreover,  in  such  a  case  there  would  be  no  occasion  for  the 
drastic  dismissal  of  the  employee  who  has  been  brought  to 
Washington.  If  the  employee,  when  actually  tested  out,  were 
found  unsuitable,  the  situation  could  be  cured  merely  by  a  re- 
detail  as  soon  as  convenient  to  the  local  service. 

Closely  related  to  this  is  the  possibility  that  the  application 
of  this  method  would  furnish  a  painless  solution  of  the  vexed 
problem  of  apportionment.  Since  the  personnel  of  many  of 
the  field  services  is  distributed  over  the  country  in  approxi- 
mate proportion  to  the  population,  the  method  suggested  would 
furnish  for  these  services  a  very  natural  application  of  the 
principle  without  the  necessity  for  any  such  rigid  mechanical 
methods  of  enforcement  as  are  now  provided. 

From  still  another  angle,  the  proposition  is  an  attractive 
one  in  that  it  could  readily  be  developed  into  a  means  of 
stimulating  and  rewarding  the  efforts  of  the  local  employees. 
The  detail  to  Washington  for  a  term  of  years  could  be  made 
by  attaching  attractive  salary  conditions  and  by  furnishing 
transportation  to  and  from  Washington,  a  prize  to  be  con- 
tended for  by  the  employee  of  the  local  service.  Particu- 
larly would  this  be  the  case  were  any  positive  measures  taken 
to  afford  the  employee  at  Washington  greater  opportunity  for 
taking  advantage  of  its  educational  facilities,  as  urged  in  an- 
other place.- 

Obviously  there  are  limits  and  the  branches  of  the  service 
differ  materially  in  respect  to  what  may  be  done  along  the  line 
here  suggested.  Inasmuch  as  the  whole  proposition  is,  so 
far  as  official  recognition  is  concerned,  almost  entirely  novel,^ 
it  has  not  been  thought  worth  wdiile  to  inquire  more  particu- 

'  The  extent  to  which  the  departmental  and  field  services  are  now 
regarded  as  distinct  is  indicated  by  the  fact  that  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission regularly  holds  separate  examinations  for  the  position  of  field, 
clerk  and  departmental  clerk,  though  the  scope  and  difficulty  of  the  ex- 
amination is  the  same  in  both  cases. 


290  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

larly,  so  far  as  such  inquiry  could  be  made  short  of  actual  ex- 
perience, what  these  limitations  are  in  the  several  services. 

The  political  appointment  of  local  chief  officers  is  an  impor- 
tant factor  in  hindering  the  extension  of  the  area  of  selection 
from  within  in  the  field  services.  Under  the  method  of  politi- 
cal appointment,  it  is,  of  course,  natural  that  the  postmaster, 
collector,  or  district  attorney  be  a  resident  of  the  district  under 
his  jurisdiction.  From  a  purely  administrative  standpoint, 
there  is,  of  course,  no  reason  why  this  should  be  so;  any  more 
than  it  is  thought  necessary  that  an  army  officer  placed  in  charge 
of  one  of  the  military  departments  into  which  the  United  States 
is  divided  need  be  a  resident  of  that  department;  or,  in  the  For- 
est Service,  that  the  forester  in  charge  of  a  national  forest  be 
a  resident  of  the  district  in  which  the  forest  is  located.  The 
practice  of  appointing  the  head  of  the  office  from  the  locality 
results  in  a  tendency  to  view  the  office  as  a  whole  as  very  much 
a  local  one,  the  personnel  of  which  is  to  be  treated  as  a  local 
organization  rather  than  as  an  integral  part  of  the  great  na- 
tional organization  of  which  it  forms  a  part.  Only  to  a  very 
limited,  almost  a  negligible,  extent  is  the  subordinate  officer  in 
the  local  post  office,  the  local  custom  house,  or  the  local  internal 
revenue  office  regarded  as  a  member  of  a  national  service  who 
may  be  assigned  to  service  wherever  his  services  can  be  used 
to  the  best  advantage  to  himself  and  to  the  service.  Only  to 
a  slight  extent  does  he  have  any  prospect  of  promotion  other 
than  what  is  offered  within  the  particular  station  or  office  to 
which  he  is  attached. 

It  is  difficult  to  conceive  of  a  scheme  of  organization  better 
adapted  to  deprive  the  personnel  of  incentive  for  good  work, 
to  stifle  ambition  for  advancement  within  the  service,  or  to  tie 
the  hands  of  a  central  administration  desiring  to  put  its  service 
upon  a  really  efficient  and  economical  basis.  Once  the  head- 
ships of  these  local  offices  were  placed  upon  a  merit  basis, 
there  undoubtedly  would  develop  in  due  course  the  complete 
"nationalization"  of  the  whole  service.^     The  chief  positions 

*  It  must  be  admitted  that  the  merit  selection  of  presidential  post- 
masters does  not  as  yet  appear  to  have  had  any  inilucnce  in  this  direction. 
The  limitation  of  competition  for  the  postmasterships,  even  of  the  larg- 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  291 

in  each  office  would  be  graded  and  classified  with  positions  of 
comparable  responsibility  and  difficulty  in  other  offices  of  the 
service ;  and  provision  would  be  made  whereby  one  performing 
distinguished  service  in  one  office  might  look  for  promotion  to 
any  one  of  the  other  offices  in  the  country  which  might  offer 
greater  opportunities  than  the  one  with  which  he  happened  to 
be  connected.  In  this  way  a  postmaster  who  had  distinguished 
himself  by  a  reorganization  or  by  a  particularly  efficient  ad- 
ministration of  a  post  office  in  a  city  of  250,000  might  be  pro- 
moted to  the  charge  of  the  post  office  in  a  city  of  1,000,000  and 
so  forth.  With  such  a  "nationalization"  of  the  service  joined 
to  a  placing  of  the  higher  positions  in  the  central  administra- 
tion at  Washington  upon  a  merit  basis,  the  great  field  admin- 
istration services  of  the  government — the  postal,  customs,  rev- 
enue, public  land,  and  similar  services — would  indeed  become 
a  field  attractive  to  men  of  ability  and  ambition,  a  field  offer- 
ing if  not  a  "career"  at  least  a  distinct  vocation. 

The  complete  and  immediate  destruction  of  the  tradition  of 
local  residence  is  not  necessary;  it  could  be  broken  down  at 
first  only  to  the  extent  of  permitting  the  transfer  of  a  post- 
master to  any  post  office  in  his  state ;  and  the  area  of  selection 
would  gradually  be  widened  by  districting  the  country. 

The  program  here  suggested  for  the  postmasterships  is,  of 
course,  equally  applicable  to  the  other  classes  of  local  chief 
officers,  as  soon  as  the  President  or  Congress  shall  place  their 
selection  on  a  merit  basis. 

Before  leaving  the  subject  of  the  area  of  selection  from 
within  a  word  may  be  said  with  respect  to  the  unclassified 
services  which  are  on  a  merit  basis — the  Public  Health  Service 
and  the  Foreign  Service.  In  the  Public  Health  Service  the  reg- 
ulations regarding  entrance  are  such  as  to  make  transfer  into 
the  service  impossible.  In  the  case  of  the  Foreign  Service,  a 
person  in  the  employ  of  the  State  Department  at  a  salary  of 
$1,800  (whether  in  a  classified  or  unclassified  position)  may  be 

est  cities,  to  residents  of  the  post  office  district  has  undoubtedly  been  a 
factor  in  sustaining  the  tradition  of  "localized"  postal  personnel.  The 
fact  that  the  system  of  selection  has  been  one  of  recruitment  and  not  of 
selection  from  within  has  been  an  equally  important  factor. 


292  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

transferred  to  any  grade  of  the  Diplomatic  Service,  and  a  per- 
son so  employed  at  a  salary  of  $2,000  or  more  may  be  trans- 
ferred to  any  grade  of  the  consular  service  above  that  at  which 
entrance  to  the  service  from  outside  is  made ;  that  is,  above  that 
of  Consul,  Class  8. 

The  diplomatic  service  and  the  consular  service  are  re- 
garded as  distinct  branches  of  the  foreign  service  and  transfers 
from  one  to  another  are  not  permitted  "unless  upon  the  desig- 
nation by  the  President  for  examination  and  the  successful 
passing  of  the  examination  prescribed  for  the  service  to  which 
such  transfer  is  made.  Unless  the  exigencies  of  the  service 
imperatively  demand  it,  such  person  to  be  transferred  shall 
not  have  preference  in  designation  for  the  taking  of  the  exami- 
nation or  in  appointment  from  the  eligible  list,  but  shall  follow 
the  course  of  procedure  prescribed  for  all  applicants  for  ap- 
pointment to  the  service  which  he  desires  to  enter." 

It  is  rather  difficult  to  perceive  the  reasons  for  this  appar- 
ent desire  to  prevent  movement  from  one  to  the  other  of  the 
branches  of  the  foreign  service. 

Technical  Obstacles  to  Selection  from  Within. — It  re- 
mains to  consider  certain  technical  obstacles  to  the  application 
of  the  principle  of  selection  from  within  which  have  developed 
in  the  federal  service  not  out  of  considerations  of  general  per- 
sonnel policy,  to  which  they  are  indeed  in  every  case  directly 
opposed,  but  out  of  technical  or  financial  conditions.  The  eflfect 
of  the  technical  obstacles  is,  in  some  cases,  not  merely  to  com- 
pel a  resort  to  general  competition  where  selection  from  within 
would  equally  well  or  better  serve  the  interests  of  the  service 
but  actually  to  make  impossible  selection  from  within,  in  effect 
awarding  a  preference  in  selection  to  those  outside  the  service. 

The  first  of  these  obstacles  to  selection  from  within  is  the 
line  of  division  between  the  competitive  and  the  excepted  posi- 
tions. It  obviously  would  be  violative  of  the  principle  of  com- 
petition if  one  who  entered  the  service  in  an  excepted  position 
were  permitted  to  be  promoted  or  reassigned  to  a  competitive 
position,  and  except  in  one  or  two  insignificant  special  cases 
the  rules  consequently  do  not  permit  this  to  be  don^.     Thus 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  293 

it  may  result,  and  occasionally  does  result,  that  though  the  in- 
terests of  the  services  would  in  the  particular  instance  best  be 
served  by  a  promotion  or  reassignment  of  this  kind,  it  cannot 
be  made. 

Except  in  the  single  matter  of  the  promotion  of  unclassified 
sub-clerical  employees  to  competitive  clerical  positions  to  which 
reference  already  has  been  made,  the  law  and  rules  recognize 
no  method  by  which  one  holding  an  unclassified  position  may 
be  given  a  classified  status  by  any  method  other  than  original 
entrance;  and  again,  within  the  classified  service,  with  minor 
exceptions,  no  person  holding  an  excepted  or  non-competitive 
position  can  be  given  a  competitive  position. 

Again  the  converse  situation  may  present  itself,  and  since 
the  excepted  position  is  more  commonly  found  in  the  higher 
levels  of  the  service  this  is  indeed  more  likely  to  occur.  It 
may  be  desired  to  promote  or  reassign  a  competitive  employee 
to  an  excepted  position.  There  is,  of  course,  no  rule  whatever 
preventing  this.  But  should  the  employee  accept  the  position 
or  reassignment  he  would  lose  his  classified  competitive  status 
and  the  protection  against  removal,  both  legal  and  traditional, 
which  this  implies.  Hence  the  result  is  not  infrequent  that  the 
competitive  employee  declines  a  favorable  reassignment  rather 
than  incur  the  risks  attached  to  the  loss  of  competitive  status. 

Being  designed  to  protect  the  competitive  principles  against 
evasion,  these  restrictions,  of  course,  are  wholly  justified  and 
some  may  even  think  them  not  sufficiently  rigid.  They  must 
be  borne  with  as  a  necessary  evil  so  long  as  the  competitive 
principle  receives  only  limited  acceptance  in  the  federal  per- 
sonnel system;  but  they  furnish  an  additional  reason  for  the 
contention  already  advanced  on  other  grounds,  that  the  present 
division  of  the  service  into  classified  and  unclassified  groups, 
and  competitive  and  excepted  groups,  is  an  impediment  to 
effective  personnel  administration  and  should  be  eliminated. 

Another  necessary  restriction  on  free  movement  within  the 
classified  competitive  service  itself  arises  out  of  the  apportion- 
ment principle.  That  principle  which  is  laid  down  in  the  civil 
service  law  (Section  2,  Second,  Third)  requires  that  "as  nearly 


294  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

as  the  conditions  of  good  administration  will  warrant  .  .  .  ap- 
pointments .  .  ."  to  positions  in  Washington  "shall  be  appor- 
tioned among  the  several  States  and  Territories  and  the  District 
of  Columbia  upon  the  basis  of  population."  It  is  to  be  noted 
that  the  act  refers  specifically  to  "appointments" ;  but  the  rules 
endeavor  to  apply  the  principle  also  to  transfers  from  a  "non- 
apportioned"  to  an  "apportioned"  position.  Where  the  state  of 
which  the  person  proposed  to  be  transferred  is  a  resident  has 
already  received  an  excessive  share  of  appointments  (or  trans- 
fers) the  transfer  can  be  effected  only  by  the  special  permission 
of  the  Commission  on  certificate  of  the  appointing  officer  that 
the  transfer  is  recpiired  in  the  interests  of  good  administration, 
setting  forth  in  detail  the  reasons  therefor.  (Rule  X,  Para- 
graph 8,  B.)  The  Commission,  in  an  official  circular,  has 
further  interpreted  this  requirement  as  follows :  ^ 

It  must  be  shown  that  the  employee  possesses  qualifications* 
not  possessed  by  persons  tested  by  competitive  examinations, 
or  some  unusual  or  highly  technical  knowledge,  ability,  or  skill 
which  is  required  for  the  most  efficient  performance  of  the 
duties  of  the  position  to  which  his  transfer  is  sought,  which 

*  "Information  Concerning  Transfers."  United  States  Civil  Service 
Commission,  Form  305,  December,  1917,  page  5.  The  distinction  between 
apportioned  and  non-apportioned  positions  and  the  method  of  applyipg 
the  rule  of  apportionment  in  original  appointments  are  discussed  in  the 
chapter  dealing  with  recruitment  methods  in  the  classified  competitive 
service.  The  following  rulings  of  the  Commission  relative  to  the  appli- 
cation of  the  apportionment  rule  in  transfers  are  of  interest  here. 

"When  an  employee  is  proposed  for  a  transfer  involving  a  charge 
to  the  quota  of  a  State  or  Territory  already  in  excess  under  the  law  of 
apportionment  the  transfer  may  be  allowed  so  far  as  the  apportionment 
is  concerned  (i)  if  at  the  time  of  the  proposed  transfer  the  State  or 
Territory  of  residence  of  such  employee  is  within  reach  of  certification 
from  the  register  appropriate  for  the  position  to  which  transfer  is  pro- 
posed; or  (2)  if  transfer  is  requested  during  the  life  of  the  register  from 
which  he  was  appointed  to  the  non-apportioned  service  and  if  the  State 
or  Territory  of  his  residence  is  reached."  (Minute  of  Commission, 
March  7,  1910.) 

"In  view  of  the  necessity  for  change  of  climate  after  service  in  the 
Tropics,  as  shown  by  the  orders  and  practice  of  the  War  Department, 
and  as  recognized  by  the  Commission  in  transfers  from  the  Philippines, 
such  orders  and  practice  will  be  regarded  as  indicating  that  such  trans- 
fers are  required  in  the  interest  of  good  administration  where  employees 
proposed  for  transfer  ftom  the  Isthmus  have  rendered  three  years  or 
more  of  satisfactory  service  and  are  otherwise  eligible.  The  apportion- 
ment will  be  waived  in  all  such  cases."  (Minute  of  Commission,  July 
18,   1910.) 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  295 

it  would  be  difficult  or  impossible  to  obtain  through  the  usual 
methods  of  fiUiiii^  such  positions.  This  showing  must  be  made 
to  the  satisfaction  of  the  Commission. 

A  final  limitation  upon  the  freedom  of  the  appointing  othcer 
to  select  from  within  the  service  arises  from  the  distinction  be- 
tween statutory  positions  and  those  the  salary  of  which  is  paid 
from  lump  sum  appropriations.  In  a  preceding  chapter  this 
distinction  was  explained  and  the  view  taken  not  only  that  the 
actual  application  of  the  distinction  was  wholly  illogical  and 
not  explainable  upon  any  consistent  basis  but  that  the  whole 
theory  of  statutory  positions  was  radically  incorrect  from  the 
standpoint  alike  of  personnel  and  of  financial  administration. 
In  the  present  connection  the  additional  fault  is  found  that 
this  useless  and  improper  distinction  is  made  the  basis  for  a 
limitation  upon  the  freedom  of  the  appointing  officer  in  select- 
ing from  within  the  service,  and  may  even  necessitate  a  resort 
to  general  competition  where  selection  from  within  the  service 
would  be  wholly  adequate. 

By  Act  of  August  26,  1912/  it  was  provided  as  follows: 
"Nor  shall  any  person  employed  at  a  specific  salary  be  hereafter 
transferred  and  hereafter  paid  from  a  lump  sum  appropriation 
at  a  rate  of  compensation  greater  than  such  specific  salary."  ^ 
The  term  "specific  salary"  in  this  act  has  been  construed  to  have 
the  same  meaning  as  "statutory"  salary.  The  effect  of  this 
provision  is  consequently  virtually  to  close  to  the  employee  so 
unfortunate  as  to  be  appointed  to  a  statutory  position  all  hope 
of  advancement  except  by  promotion  to  another  statutory  posi- 

'  36  Stat.  626.  This  act  applied  only  to  the  fiscal  year  1913.  By  act 
of  March  4,  1913  (37  Stat.  790),  the  provision  was  made  permanent. 

'The  section  also  requires  that  "heads  of  departments  shall  cause 
this  provision  to  be  enforced."  In  the  same  section  is  contained  the  re- 
striction already  referred  to  in  the  chapter  dealing  with  compensation, 
prohibiting  the  payment  of  personal  service  at  a  rate  of  compensation 
in  excess  of  that  paid  for  the  same  or  similar  service  during  the  preced- 
ing fiscal  year.  The  section  also  contains  a  proviso  "that  this  section 
shall  not  apply  to  mechanics,  artisans,  their  helpers  or  assistants,  laborers, 
or  any  other  employees  whose  duties  are  of  similar  character,  required 
in  carrying  on  the  various  manufacturing  and  construction  operations  of 
the  Government."  While  in  terms  this  proviso  applies  to  the  entire 
section,  its  specific  application  is  chiefly  if  not  solely  to  the  provision 
just  referred  to  regarding  payment  at  rates  in  excess  of  those  paid  in 
the  preceding  year. 


296  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

tion,  in  which  case  his  situation  as  respects  subsequent  promo- 
tion is  again  the  same.  It  is  exceedingly  difficult  for  him  to 
obtain  from  Congress  an  increase  in  the  statutory  salary  which 
he  enjoys  and  it  is  against  the  law  for  his  administrative  su- 
perior to  promote  him  to  a  position  at  a  higher  salary,  which 
is  paid  out  of  a  lump  sum  appropriation.  Under  these  circum- 
stances, it  is  not  surprising  that  not  a  few  incumbents  of  statu- 
tory positions  found  the  sole  avenue  of  escape  in  entering  open 
competitive  examinations  and  securing  original  appointment  to 
the  service  at  increased  rates  of  compensation.  As  applied  to 
appointment  within  the  same  department,  however,  the  Comp- 
troller of  the  Treasury  soon  ruled  that  this  procedure  was  an 
evasion  of  the  law  when,  as  was  almost  always  the  case,  the 
position  to  which  appointment  was  made  was  paid  from  a  lump 
sum  appropriation.  As  respects  appointment  to  other  depart- 
ments, on  the  other  hand,  Congress,  in  19 17,  enacted  the  statute 
to  which  reference  has  already  been  made,  prohibiting  the  pay- 
ment out  of  a  lump  sum  appropriation,  to  any  person  hitherto 
employed  in  another  department,  of  a  higher  salary  than  he  re- 
ceived in  such  department,  within  one  year  after  the  cessation 
of  his  service  in  the  first  department.  In  short,  in  the  attempt 
to  prevent  possible  minor  abuses  in  the  fixing  of  compensation 
rates  by  administrative  officers,  made  possible  only  by  its  own 
complete  failure  to  provide  a  standard  classification  of  duties 
and  a  standard  scale  of  compensation  rates.  Congress,  by  suc- 
cessive enactments,  has  built  up  around  the  unfortunate  in- 
cumbent of  the  statutory  position  a  prison  from  which  there  is 
hardly  any  escape  except  by  resignation  from  the  service. 

One  may  derive  a  certain  satisfaction  in  the  contemplation 
of  this  sorry  history  from  observing  how  completely  Con- 
gress has  failed  to  place  any  restriction  whatever  in  the  way  of 
reassignment  from  one  "lump  sum''  position  to  another.  As 
was  set  forth  in  the  preceding  chapter,  the  number  of  positions 
and  the  payroll  totals  paid  from  lump  sum  appropriations 
greatly  exceed  those  on  the  statutory  rolls.  The  apparent  fail- 
ure of  the  Congressional  committees  to  appreciate  the  incon- 
sistency in  the  legislation  which  they  have  developed  on  this 


PROMOTION  VERSUS  RECRUITMENT  297 

head  is  indicative  of  the  lack  of  comprehensive  study  and 
planning  which  has  been  so  characteristic  of  nearly  all  Congres- 
sional action  in  personnel  matters. 


CHAPTER  IX 

METHODS   OF   SELECTION   FROM   WITHIN:   REASSIGNMENT 
AND   PROMOTION 

To  consider  methods  of  selection  from  within  before  con- 
sidering methods  of  recruitment  may  at  first  sight  appear  il- 
logical. In  the  life  history  of  the  employee,  recruitment  must 
precede  promotion  or  reassignment;  and  in  the  construction 
of  a  new  personnel  system,  the  first  step  must  be  that  of  re- 
cruitment. In  a  well  established,  going  organization  such  as 
the  federal  service,  however,  recruitment  should  be  resorted  to 
only  when  selection  from  within  does  not  promise  satisfactory 
results.  From  the  standpoint  of  a  going  concern,  therefore,  a 
discussion  of  the  methods  of  selection  from  within  logically 
precedes  a  consideration  of  methods  of  recruitment. 
Promotion  and  Reassignment  Distinguished  from  Increase 
of  Compensation. — At  the  outset  promotion  and  reassign- 
ment should  be  clearly  distinguished  from  a  mere  change  in 
compensation.  The  former,  in  their  proper  senses,  are  methods 
of  selection  from  within  the  service  for  a  particular  post,  and 
imply  selection  for  a  position  which  is  rated  as  of  a  different 
grade  than  the  one  formerly  occupied.  A  mere  salary  change, 
on  the  other  hand,  has  nothing  to  do  with  selection  for  a 
vacancy.  There  is  no  selection  of  a  particular  employee  for  a 
particular  post.  The  employee  continues  to  perform  the  same 
duties  in  the  same  iX)sition,  but  at  a  different  rate  of  compensa- 
tion. 

Obvious  as  this  distinction  is,  it  has  been  necessary  to  point 
it  out,  since  it  is  one  that  must  be  kept  in  mind  constantly  in 
endeavoring  to  think  clearly  al^out  matters  of  personnel,  and 
because,  despite  its  obviousness,  it  is  so  frequently  lost  sight 
of  in  discussions  on  the  subject.  Methods  adapted  for  deter- 
mining salary  increases  are  wholly  unsuitable  for  determining 

298 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  299 

selections  for  posts  of  greater  responsibility.     The  absence  of 
well  defined  titles  with  precise  descriptions  of  duties  is  the  con- 
dition primarily  responsible   for  a  failure  to  appreciate  this 
distinction.     Where  such  a  classification  exists,  the  difference 
between  a  mere  increase  of  salary  within  the  same  class  of 
duties,  and  a  change  in  duties  involving  a  clearly  higher  re- 
sponsibility, is  clear  to  every  one.     At  this  point,  therefore,  as 
at  so  many  preceding  and  subsequent  points  the  fundamental 
value  of  a  clear  classification  of  positions  again  reveals  itself. 
Reassignment  versus  Promotion. — The   consideration  of 
reassignments  together  with  promotions  may  not  be  clear  at 
first  sight.     To  the  employee,  a  promotion  generally  means  a 
much  greater  advance  in  compensation  than  does  what  com- 
monly goes  by  the  name  of  a  reassignment;  but  looked  at  as 
operations  of  the  personnel  system,  both  are  designed  to  move 
an  individual  to  a  position  in  which  he  will  be  of  greater  value 
to  the  service.    The  primary  difiference  between  the  two  is  that, 
in  promotion,  the  position  to  which  the  employee  is  moved  is 
recognized  as  being  so  much  higher  in  responsibility  or  difficulty 
as  to  be  in  a  higher  grade,  whereas,  in  reassignment,  the  dif- 
ference is  not  sufificient  to  constitute  a  difiference  in  grade. 
Again  a  notion  of  permanency  is  associated  with  promotion, 
whereas  reassignment  carries  with  it  no  such  element.     A  final 
distinguishing  feature  of  reassignment  is  that  it  may  involve, 
in  some  cases,  a  mere  change  of  position  and  duties  without 
any  change  in  the  degree  of  responsibility  or  in  the  difficulty 
of  the  duties.     Even  In  this  case,  however,  the  process,  from 
the    standpoint    of    personnel    administration,    has    the    same 
object ;  that  of  selecting  an  employee  for  a  position  in  which 
he  can  render  better  service. 

Reassignments  of  another  type  are  sometimes  encountered, 
especially  in  large  services  with  a  considerable  number  of  per- 
sons performing  the  same  services  on  a  standardized  basis.  An 
employee  may  be  moved  from  one  part  of  the  organization  to 
another  where  he  continues  to  perform  the  same  duties.  Such 
reassignment  may  be  made  to  meet  changes  in  the  needs  for 
service  or  they  may  be  made  to  meet  the  personal  preference 


300  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

of  the  employee.  Reassignment  to  a  position  involving  the 
same  duties  and  responsibilities  in  another  branch  of  the  or- 
ganization, made  merely  to  m^eet  a  change  in  the  flow  or  load 
of  work,  is  generally  a  purely  administrative  matter  outside 
the  field  of  personnel  administration.  Reassignments  to  meet 
the  personal  preferences  of  the  employee  involve  questions  of 
maintaining  the  general  morale  and  individual  efficiency  and 
will  receive  consideration  in  the  chapters  dealing  with  this 
subject. 

In  approaching  the  subject  of  the  methods  of  reassignment 
and  promotion  mention  should  be  made  again  of  the  numerous 
restrictions  in  current  statutes  and  rules  which  limit  the  power 
of  administrative  officers  formally  to  reassign  personnel  from 
one  branch  of  the  service  to  another.  Those  restrictions  have 
been  fully  discussed  already  in  the  preceding  chapter  and  need 
not  be  reviewed  here. 

Reassignment  Involving  No  Change  of  Compensation  or 
Grade. — No  adequate  organization  or  procedure  has  been 
developed  in  the  federal  service  for  studying  the  special 
qualifications  or  preferences  of  individual  employees  or  the 
special  requirements  of  particular  positions  with  a  view  to  a 
matching  of  the  two.  Nor  in  few,  if  any,  services  are  vacancies 
in  the  several  divisions  subjected  to  systematic  scrutiny  by 
the  administrative  officer  foK  the  purpose  of  selecting  the  most 
deserving  employees  for  the  positions  which  hold  greatest 
promise  of  promotion. 

In  a  small  bureau,  a  single  central  personnel  officer  is  able 
to  keep  watch  over  the  whole  of  the  personnel  and  organiza- 
tion. In  the  larger  bureaus  or  services,  however,  such  a  single 
central  officer  will  not  be  sufficient.  Responsibility  for  study- 
ing the  personnel  and  the  current  changes  in  organization  must 
be  developed  at  lower  levels.  In  each  major  division,  and,  if 
the  size  of  the  organization  justifies,  in  each  unit  of  each  di- 
vision, such  a  study  should  be  the  definite  duty  of  some  capable 
assistant;  and  those  so  detailed  should  be  brought  together  in 
a  central  organization  for  conference  and  decision,  headed, 
perhaps,  by  the  chief  personnel  officer  of  the  bureau  or  service. 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  301 

Through  such  machinery  far  greater  assurance  can  be  had 
than  under  present  conditions  tliat  the  work  and  the  employees 
will  be  properly  matched ;  and  that  opportunities  for  reassign- 
ments  making  for  greater  efficiency  or  more  harmonious  work- 
ing relations  will  be  revealed  and  utilized. 

Reassignment  from  one  bureau  or  service  of  a  department 
to  another  is  naturally  much  less  common  than  is  reassign- 
ment within  a  given  service  or  bureau,  and,  as  already  seen, 
the  restrictions  upon  such  reassignment  are  more  severe.  Here, 
too,  however,  an  elaboration,  for  the  department  as  a  whole,  of 
the  machinery  suggested  for  a  single  bureau  or  service  for 
developing  opportunities  for  reassignment  is  greatly  to  be  de- 
sired. A  periodical  conference  of  personnel  officers  of  the 
several  bureaus  or  services  of  a  department  would  be  an  ef- 
fective way  of  accomplishing  this  end. 

Such  a  conference,  however,  need  not  consist  of  a  single 
officer  from  each  unit.  If  the  personnel  falls,  as  it  usually  does, 
into  distinct  classes,  it  may  be  desirable  to  designate  an  officer 
for  each  group,  and  for  the  officers  interested  in  cognate  groups 
only  to  meet  for  interchange  of  opinion  or  for  joint  decision. 
This  latter  type  of  organization  is  especially  adaptable  to  the 
federal  service  as  a  whole.  With  respect  to  so  large  a  group 
as  the  clerical  services,  an  organization  of  this  kind  would  be 
confronted  with  a  fairly  sizeable  task  but  one  which,  if  the 
lower  units  were  functioning  properly,  would  be  readily  man- 
ageable. In  other  services,  however,  as,  for  example,  in  the 
chemical  and  medical  and  engineering  services,  the  area  covered 
would  be  so  small  as  to  make  any  elaborate  or  expensive  organ- 
ization of  such  central  group  unnecessary. 

The  several  departments  having  developed  no  organization 
for  their  individual  use  have  not  cooperated,  of  course,  in  de- 
veloping an  organization  for  the  reassignment  of  the  person- 
nel from  one  department  to  another;  and  under  the  existing 
restrictive  regulations,  designed  to  prevent  the  free  movement 
of  personnel  from  one  department  to  another,  it  must  be  ad- 
mitted that  such  an  organization  or  procedure  could  find 
but  little  scope  for  usefulness. 


302  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

The  failure  of  the  several  departments  up  to  this  time  to 
make  any  greater  progress  than  above  indicated  in  the  develop- 
ment of  definite  organization  and  procedure  for  handling  mat- 
ters of  reassignment  of  personnel  is  to  be  charged  primarily  to 
the  departments  themselves  and  perhaps  especially  to  the  per- 
sonnel officers  of  those  departments.  The  office  of  appointment 
clerk  in  the  several  departments  has  been  regarded  as  in  the 
nature  of  a  clerical  rather  than  an  executive,  administrative,  or 
even  consultative  post.  Had  this  not  been  the  case  it  is  cer- 
tain that  this  important  matter  would  have  received  attention. 
The  Civil  Service  Commission,  hov^^ever,  must  bear  its  share  of 
the  responsibility.  Had  it  construed  its  functions  properly  it 
would  have  taken  the  initiative  in  assisting  and  urging  the  de- 
partments towards  the  development  of  an  organization  of  this 
type. 

In  this  connection  should  be  considered  the  desirability 
of  giving  special  attention  to  the  assignment  of  new  recruits. 
In  some  cases  duties  are  so  specialized  and  vacancies  so  infre- 
quent that  the  process  of  selection  is  designed  solely  with  an 
eye  to  those  peculiar  duties.  The  persons  selected  are  thus 
automatically  assigned  to  those  duties;  and  if  they  fail  to  suit, 
cannot  be  turned  to  other  use.  In  other  cases,  appointments 
are  so  frequent  and  numerous  that  considerable  latitude  is  left 
for  administrative  discretion  in  determining  the  particular 
duties  or  place  to  which  each  recruit  is  to  be  assigned  and.  more 
especially,  for  observing  the  performance  of  the  recruit  during 
the  first  few  days  or  weeks  of  employment  with  a  view,  if 
necessary,  to  reassigning  him  or  lier  to  more  appropriate  duties. 
It  is  the  well  nigh  universal  experience  in  personnel  manage- 
ment that  the  mere  interest  of  the  administrator  in  securing  the 
effective  performance  of  his  work  does  not  suffice  to  insure 
that  he  will  give  adequate  attention  to  this  matter.  Unless 
special  means  are  taken  to  insure  that  the  work  of  the  recruit 
is  carefully  observed  and  consideration  given  to  the  desir- 
ability of  reassignment,  the  matter  will  be  substantially 
neglected. 

Special  measures  to  be  taken  under  this  head  consist  in 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  303 

the  institution  of  a  procedure  for  a  regular  report  by  the  im- 
mediate superior  of  the  recruit,  at  f  recjuent  intervals  during  the 
first  few  months  of  the  recruit's  service,  to  the  administrative 
officer  charged  with  responsibility  for  the  work  of  locating  each 
member  of  the  force  at  a  point  where  he  will  be  of  greatest 
service, 

Reassignments  Involving  Increase  of  Compensation. — In 
respect  to  the  methods  to  be  used  in  selection,  reassignments 
involving  increase  of  compensation  do  not  differ  materially 
from  reassignments  involving  no  such  increase.  The  applica- 
tion of  correct  methods  is,  however,  in  such  cases,  more  im- 
portant. A  reassignment  involving  increase  of  compensation 
is,  from  the  standpoint  of  the  personnel  system,  merely  a  se- 
lection of  the  employee  best  qualified  for  the  new  assignment. 
From  the  standpoint  of  the  employee,  however,  it  is  also  a 
reward  for  previous  faithful  and  efficient  service.  In  many 
cases  the  employee  most  fit  for  the  reassignment  is  also  the 
most  deserving  of  recognition  as  a  reward  for  previous  service. 
Not  infrequently,  however,  cases  arise  where  the  employee 
peculiarly  fitted  for  the  vacancy  is  not,  from  the  standpoint 
of  length,  or  even  efficiency,  of  service,  the  most  deserving. 
His  selection,  though  seemingly  advantageous,  may  thus  re- 
sult also  in  a  loss  of  zeal,  or  even  discontent,  on  the  part  of 
other  employees.  The  administrative  officer  is  here  confronted 
with  two  opposing  considerations,  and  the  choice  between  them 
must  be  made  purely  on  the  basis  of  the  balancing  of  the  two. 
The  same  considerations  apply,  though  perhaps  even  more 
sharply,  in  the  case  of  promotion.  To  devise  any  mechanical 
procedure  for  this  purpose  would  be  difficult  if  not  impossible. 
The  Case  for  Formal  Promotion  Methods. — AVhere,  how- 
ever, the  increase  in  responsibility  and  compensation  is  as  great 
as  is  usually  the  case  in  a  promotion,  the  case  for  restrict- 
ing the  free  discretion  of  the  administrative  officer  by  some 
formal  method  of  selection  for  promotion  is  much  stronger. 
There  is  thus  presented  one  of  the  most  difficult  questions  en- 
countered in  the  whole  field  of  personnel  administration — that 
of  formal  methods  in  selecting  for  promotion.     That  the  use 


304  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

of  such  aids  to  judgment  is  highly  desirable  need  hardly  be 
stated.  A  mistake  in  promotion  is,  generally  speaking,  far 
more  serious  than  a  mistake  in  recruitment.  An  error  in  re- 
cruitment, especially  in  the  lower  grades,  may  usually  be  more 
or  less  completely  remedied  by  the  reassignment  of  the  in- 
dividual selected,  or  in  extreme  cases  by  his  dismissal  before 
or  at  the  end  of  the  probationary  period.  In  the  case  of  pro- 
motion, however,  a  selection  once  made  is  generally  difficult 
to  unmake.  The  officer  having  responsibility,  therefore,  should 
employ  whatever  aids  suggest  themselves  to  him  as  worthy  to 
assist  his  judgment.  The  use  of  service  records  or  efficiency 
records,  covering  the  service  of  the  employees  from  among 
whom  selection  is  to  be  made  for  a  considerable  period,  is 
manifestly  highly  desirable.  Unless  the  employees  are  few 
in  number,  the  administrative  officer  without  such  aids  is  apt 
to  overlook  or  forget  past  incidents,  facts,  or  pieces  of  work, 
which  may  have  an  important  bearing  upon  the  determination 
of  relative  merits  of  the  several  employees  for  promotion. 

It  is  evident  that  aids  to  the  administrative  officer  in  select- 
ing employees  for  promotion  may  be  of  two  kinds  :  those  volun- 
tarily established  by  him  and  those  required  by  statute  or  some 
superior  authority.  It  is  with  the  latter  only  that  the  considera- 
tion that  follows  has  to  do. 

In  the  later  discussion  of  formal  methods  of  recruitment, 
it  will  be  pointed  out  that,  although  those  methods  originated 
solely  in  the  desire  to  restrict  the  discretion  of  administrative 
officers,  for  the  purpose  of  preventing  the  familiar  abuses  that 
develop  in  the  absence  of  formal  methods,  they  are  basically 
justified  by  the  inherent  requirements  of  recruitment  itself. 
Even  if  the  discretion  of  the  administrative  officer  in  respect  to 
recruitment  is  left  unhampered,  he  must,  unless  his  selections 
are  to  be  determined  wholly  without  reference  to  the  needs  of 
the  service,  employ  methods  not  unlike  those  developed  in  re- 
sponse to  the  demand  for  civil  service  reform.  In  promotion, 
however,  the  situation  is  entirely  different.  Here,  in  all  but 
the  largest  organizations,  the  administrative  officer  is  in  such 
close  touch  with  his  subordinates  that  a  formal  process  of  se- 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  305 

lection  for  promotion  is  not  imperative.  When  a  vacancy 
arises  which  may  be  filled  by  promotion,  the  administrator 
usually  knows  almost  as  a  foregone  conclusion  the  employee 
most  suitable  for  promotion.  Even  if  the  administrator  is 
without  personal  knowledge  of  the  eligibles  for  a  given  pro- 
motion, they  are  seldom  so  numerous  as  to  make  impracticable 
selection  by  a  personal  canvass  of  their  relative  merits.  The 
imposition  of  formal  methods  of  selection  can  thus  be  justi- 
fied, if  at  all,  only  on  the  ground,  either  that  they  tend  to  re- 
sult in  a  better  selection  than  would  the  informal  exercise  of 
judgment  by  the  administrative  officer,  or  that  some  more  or 
less  mechanical  restriction  on  the  discretion  of  the  latter  is 
necessary  to  prevent  the  abuse  of  that  discretion  for  political 
or  personal  reasons. 

The  employment  of  formal  methods  of  selection  for  promo- 
tion thus,  in  hardly  any  case,  springs  from  any  real  need  for 
such  methods  inherent  in  the  process  itself.  Their  use  can  be 
justified,  therefore,  only  on  the  ground  of  the  necessity  for 
some  restriction  on  the  discretion  of  the  administrative  officer. 
The  chief  reason  why  such  restriction  may  be  deemed  desir- 
able is,  of  course,  the  need  for  preventing  the  entrance  of  politi- 
cal or  other  improper  considerations  in  making  selection  for 
promotion. 

The  exclusion  of  political  or  personal  considerations  from 
promotion  is  no  less  important  than  their  exclusion  from  re- 
cruitment. Where  the  entire  system  of  recruitment  is  domi- 
nated by  politics,  the  whole  personnel  system  is,  of  course, 
poisoned  at  its  source.  Where,  however,  politics  does  not 
completely  control  the  appointment  process,  but  merely  oc- 
casionally influences  a  selection  for  appointment,  the  conse- 
quences are,  in  most  cases,  not  nearly  so  serious  as  in  the  in- 
jection of  political  considerations  in  matters  of  promotion. 
The  reason  is  obvious.  The  political  appointee  merely  prevents 
the  appointment  of  one,  who  while  actually  more  deserving,  has 
nevertheless  no  special  claim  upon  the  position;  but  the  politi- 
cal selection  of  one  employee  for  promotion  as  against  other 
employees  actually  deserving  of  the  promotion,  deprives  the 


3o6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

deserving  employees  of  perhaps  the  chief  reward  for  which 
they  have  been  striving  during  long  years  of  service.  Even 
an  occasional  political  promotion  is  thus  a  severe  blow  at  the 
integrity  of  the  personnel  system. 

The  elimination  of  political  consideration  from  promo- 
tion is  not,  however,  the  only  purpose  for  which  formal  meth- 
ods of  selection  may  be  instituted.  Closely  related  to  it  is 
the  desirability  of  giving  the  employees  that  assurance  of  im- 
personal fairness  in  making  promotions  which  the  use  of  for- 
mal methods  provides.  Though  administrative  officers  may  not 
be  actuated  by  personal  or  political  considerations,  neverthe- 
less a  feeling  not  infrequently  arises  among  the  employees  that 
such  motives  do  have  weight.  Incidentally  it  may  l3e  remarked 
that,  in  not  a  few  instances,  the  employees  in  daify  working 
relations  with  the  person  selected  for  promotion  are  in  a  better 
position  to  form  an  estimate  of  his  capabilities  and  limitations 
than  the  superior  whose  contact  with  him  has  not  been  so 
intimate.  Whether  this  is  so  or  not,  the  fact  remains  that  in 
most  large  organizations,  public  or  private,  the  uncontrolled 
exercise  of  discretion  in  selections  for  promotion  almost  in- 
variably tends  to  result  in  general  dissatisfaction.  For  this 
reason  the  use  of  formal  methods  of  selection  for  promotion 
may  be  regarded  as  inherently  desirable. 

The  extent  to  which  formal  methods  of  selection  for  pro- 
motion should  be  employed  in  the  federal  service  depends, 
therefore,  upon  the  answers  to  two  questions:  the  extent  to 
which  present  conditions  in  the  federal  service  warrant  the 
belief  that  formal  methods  of  selection  for  promotion  are 
necessary  to  prevent  improper  considerations  in  making  promo- 
tions and  the  extent  to  which  it  is  practicable  to  impose  for- 
mal methods  of  selection  for  promotion  which  will  be  actually 
effective  in  securing  a  selection  of  the  most  deserving.  It  is  not 
to  be  assumed,  as  is  so  often  done,  that  rigid  restrictions  on 
the  discretion  of  the  administrative  officer  in  making  promo- 
tions are  per  se  desirable  and  beneficent.  In  point  of  fact, 
as  is  common  knowledge  among  those  who  have  given  the 
subject  any  first-hand  study,  the  development  of  safeguards  of 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  307 

this  character,  which  will  not  impair  the  efficiency  of  the  se- 
lective process,  is  a  matter  of  extreme  difficulty.  Particularly 
is  this  so  if  such  safeguards  take  the  form  of  positive  mechani- 
cal methods  of  selection — as  by  seniority,  efficiency  records, 
or  examination. 

Existing  Promotion  Methods. — In  seeking  an  answer  to 
the  two  questions  that  have  been  propounded  it  is  desirable 
first,  to  determine  the  current  situation  in  the  federal  service, 
both  as  to  the  existence  of  formal  methods  of  selection  for 
promotion,  and,  where  such  methods  of  selection  do  not  ob- 
tain, the  extent  to  which  political  or  personal  considerations 
now  tend  to  influence,  if  not  control. 

The  slight  provision  now  found  in  the  federal  service  for 
substituting  formal  methods  of  selection  for  promotion,  in 
whole  or  in  part,  for  the  discretion  of  the  administrative  offi- 
cer falls  under  two  heads :  central  and  departmental.  The  cen- 
tral restrictions  are  imposed  upon  the  departments  by  statutes, 
civil  service  rules,  or  executive  order,  and  are  beyond  the  con- 
trol of  the  department  itself. 

Central  Restrictions. — In  the  preceding  chapter  mention 
was  made  of  the  requirement  in  the  classified  service  for  ex- 
amination by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  when  a  person  is 
proposed  for  promotion  to  a  position  the  entrance  tests  for 
which  are  different  from  those  for  the  position  then  held  by  the 
employee.  In  that  chapter,  this  provision  was  considered  from 
the  standpoint  of  its  effectiveness  in  ensuring  that,  if  the  ad- 
ministrative officer  selects  from  within,  the  person  selected 
shall  be  at  least  of  a  minimum  capability.  This  provision,  of 
course,  is  also  in  effect  a  restriction  upon  the  discretion  of  the 
administrative  officer  in  making  selection  for  promotion.  It 
is,  however,  of  a  wholly  negative  character,  merely  preventing 
him  from  selecting  one  so  wholly  below  a  proper  standard 
of  capacity  as  to  be  unable  to  meet  even  the  qualifying  rating 
set  for  the  examination.  In  subsequent  sections  dealing  with 
positive  methods  by  which  the  actual  selection  of  the  particular 
employee  is  determined,  discussion  will  be  had  of  efficiency 
records  and  also  of  competitive  examinations  for  promotion. 


3o8  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

The  use  of  either  of  these  methods  as  a  positive  means  of  se- 
lection may,  and  ahiiost  invariably  does,  imply  the  setting  of 
a  minimum  standard  of  attainment  either  on  efficiency  record 
or  on  the  competitive  examination,  which  is  a  prerequisite  to 
selection  for  promotion.  Again,  even  where  the  system  of 
selection  by  seniority  exists,  a  minimum  requirement  may  be 
set.  In  all  these  latter  cases,  however,  the  existence  of  a 
minimum  requirement  is  of  secondary  importance  since  the 
method  itself  involves  a  more  or  less  complete  suppression  of 
the  discretion  of  the  administrative  of^cer  by  a  more  or  less 
mechanical  method  of  selection;  so  that  it  is  not  highly  ma- 
terial whether  there  is  also  incidentally  a  negative  restriction 
in  the  form  of  a  minimum  requirement. 

Wholly  logical  as  is  the  requirement  of  a  minimum  stand- 
ard of  ef^ciency  for  promotion,  it  appropriately  finds  its  place 
chiefly  in  a  personnel  system  which  has  not  yet  emerged  from 
the  stage  of  political  domination  in  its  grossest  form.  Once 
that  stage  is  passed,  it  is  altogether  unlikely  that  the  admin- 
istrative officer  will  so  far  set  at  naught  the  requirements  of 
efficiency  as  to  select  for  promotion  one  so  devoid  of  capacity  as 
to  have  been  unable  to  obtain  even  the  required  minimum  on 
his  efficiency  rating  or  on  the  qualifying  examination. 

The  civil  service  rule  bearing  upon  promotion  (Rule  XI) 
enjoins  upon  the  Commission  the  principle  that  "competitive 
test  or  examination  shall,  as  far  as  practicable  and  useful,  be 
established  to  test  fitness  for  promotion  in  the  classified 
service."  (Section  i.)  The  Commission  in  1910  stated  that 
"in  promotion  from  one  grade  to  another  it  is  believed  that 
examinations  now  prescribed  by  the  rules  may  profitably  be 
made  competitive  where  there  is  a  sufficient  number  of  em- 
ployees to  justify  it."  ^  Nevertheless  the  Commission,  in  no 
single  case,  has  required  that  an  examination  for  promotion 
within  the  competitive  service  shall  be  competitive.  The  only 
instance  in  which  the  competitive  method,  involving  competi- 
tive examination  by  the  Commission,  is  now  employed,  is  in 

*  Tvventy-seventli  Report  of  tlie  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion (1910),  p.  27. 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  309 

connection  with  the  promotion  of  persons  in  the  labor  class, 
in  the  so-called  sub-clerical  capacities  of  watchmen,  messengers, 
and  the  like,  to  the  position  of  clerk  in  the  classified  service. 
Under  the  regulations,  competitive  examinations  are  held  for 
such  promotions,  to  which  all  persons  within  the  departments 
eligible  to  promotion  compete  and  a  single  eligible  list  is 
established  for  the  entire  department.  The  competitive  fea- 
ture of  these  examinations  is,  however,  rather  more  nominal 
than  real.  Inasmuch  as  the  number  of  candidates  is  always 
small  in  comparison  to  the  clerical  requirements  of  the  de- 
partment, virtually  every  sub-clerical  employee  who  passes  the 
examinations  is  eventually  appointed.  The  only  effect  of  the 
examination  is  thus  to  determine  the  order  of  priority  in 
which  promotions  shall  be  made,  not  to  select  for  promotion 
one  from  many,  as  would  be  the  efifect  were  the  competitive 
method  applied  to  the  more  important  promotions  in  which 
the  supply  of  eligibles  is  far  in  excess  of  possible  demand. 

In  the  unclassified  services,  the  statutory  or  other  central 
requirements  regarding  promotion  methods  are  equally  minor. 
The  most  important  are  found  in  the  case  of  the  commissioned 
officers  of  the  Public  Health  Service  and  the  Coast  and  Geo- 
detic Survey.  In  the  Public  Health  Service  there  is  a  statutory 
restriction  which  provides  that :  "No  officer  shall  be  promoted 
to  the  rank  of  passed  assistant  surgeon  (the  second  grade  of 
the  service)  until  after  four  years  of  service  and  a  second 
examination  as  aforesaid ;  ^  and  no  passed  assistant  surgeon 
shall  be  promoted  to  be  surgeon  until  after  due  examination."  ^ 
No  statutory  provision  exists  with  reference  to  promotion  to 
the  rank  of  senior  surgeon  or  assistant  surgeon  general.  In 
the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  the  law  requires  examination 
prior  to  promotion  to  any  grade  lower  than  the  head  of  the 
organization.^ 

In  the  foreign  service,  the  executive  order  of  1906,  estab- 

*  The  reference  is  to  the  provision  for  entrance  examination  made 
in  the  preceding  section,  which  requires  "a  satisfactory  examination  in 
the  several  branches  of  medicine,  surgery,  and  hygiene  before  a  board  of 
medical  officers  of  the  said  service." 

'Act  of  January  4,  1899  (25  Stat.,  639). 

'40  Stat.,  88. 


310  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

lishing  the  present  system  of  examinations  for  admission  to 
the  consular  service,  makes  the  following  provision  relative 
to  methods  of  promotion  in  that  service  (Section  lo)  :  ^ 

No  promotion  shall  be  made  except  for  efficiency,  as  shown 
by  the  work  that  the  officer  has  accomplished,  the  ability, 
promptness,  and  diligence  displayed  by  him  in  the  performance 
of  his  official  duties,  his  conduct  and  his  fitness  for  the  con- 
sular service. 

In  the  diplomatic  service  it  is  enjoined  by  the  order  of  1909, 
which  established  entrance  examinations  for  this  service  (Sec. 
2),  that  "there  may  be  no  promotion  except  upon  well  estab- 
lished efficiency  as  shown  in  the  service."  These  requirements 
have  in  both  cases  manifestly  only  a  moral  value.-  Over  the 
remainder  of  the  foreign  service  no  central  regulations  are 
applied.  It  need  hardly  be  added  that  in  the  various  agencies 
whose  personnel  is  excepted  in  whole  or  in  part  from  require- 
ments of  the  civil  service  law  there  exists  no  statutory  re- 
strictions regulating  promotion,  nor  is  any  procedure  imposed 
by  civil  service  rule  or  executive  order. 

Departmental  Restrictions. — Passing  now  to  the  provi- 
sions which  have  been  made  by  the  departments  themselves 
for  regulating  promotions,  it  may  be  said  with  substantial  ac- 
curacy that  such  regulations  exist  over  an  area  of  the  service 
so  small  as  to  be  almost  negligible.  In  the  departmental  service 
at  Washington  orders  are  to  be  found  in  most  of  the  depart- 
ments calling  for  the  maintenance  of  service  or  efficiency  rec- 
ords for  most  classes  of  employees.  The  forms  provided  for 
the  maintenance  of  these  records  and  the  regulations  governing 
the  making  of  the  entries  themselves  are  extremely  diverse. 

*  It  is  also  provided  in  the  section  (Sec.  i)  providing-  for  the  filling 
of  all  grades  above  that  of  consul  class  8  by  promotion,  that  such  promo- 
tion shall  be  "based  upon  ability  and  efficiency  as  shown  in  the  service." 

^  The  unregulated  discretion  in  making  selection  for  promotion  in 
the  consular  and  diplomatic  services  now  vested  in  the  President  is  not 
qualified  even  to  the  extent  of  requiring  that  a  consul  or  secretary  serve 
a  given  length  of  time  in  any  one  grade  (or  any  time  whatever)  before 
promotion  to  the  next  higher  grade.  The  policy  represented  by  such  a 
regulation,  however,  is  adliered  to  in  practice  except  under  very  special 
circumstances.  (Report  on  the  Foreign  Service,  National  Civil  Service 
Reform  League,  p.  61.) 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  311 

Consideration  of  these  variations,  so  far  as  it  is  practicable,  is 
reserved  for  a  subsequent  section  in  which  the  place  of  efficiency 
records  in  the  process  of  selecting  for  promotion  is  separately 
discussed.  For  the  present  purpose  it  is  sufficient  to  say  that 
in  virtually  no  case  is  controlling  force  accorded  to  these  rec- 
ords. They  are  regarded  almost  invariably  as  a  mere  guide 
to  the  discretion  of  the  administrative  officer.^ 

In  the  foreign  service,  in  the  student  interpreter  corps,  a 
system  of  qualifying  examinations  is  in  force  as  a  prerequisite 
to  the  advancement  from  the  grade  of  interpreter  to  that  of 
interpreter  qualified  for  the  post  of  assistant  Japanese,  Chinese, 
or  Turkish  secretary,  and  again  from  that  rank  to  the  rank  of 
interpreter  qualified  for  the  grade  of  consul  or  for  the  post 
of  Japanese,  Chinese,  or  Turkish  secretary,  and,  subject  to 
such  examination,  promotion  to  these  grades  is  by  seniority. 
Within  the  consular  and  diplomatic  services  proper,  however, 
no  formal  promotional  procedure  is  prescribed. 

In  the  Public  Health  Service,  by  departmental  regulations, 
promotions  from  the  grade  of  assistant  surgeon  to  that  of 
passed  assistant  surgeon,  and  from  the  grade  of  passed  as- 
sistant surgeon  to  that  of  surgeon  are  governed  by  seniority, 
and  must  be  awarded  at  the  end  of  a  given  period  of  service 
(fixed  at  four  years  in  the  first  grade  and  at  eight  years  in 
the  second  grade),  upon  the  passing  of  a  qualifying  examina- 
tion. As  will  be  pointed  out  subsequently,  however,  the  man- 
datory and  well  nigh  automatic  promotions  thus  found  in  this 
service  do  not  in  themselves  represent  actual  selection  for  ad- 
vancement but  merely  the  attainment  of  a  higher  rank  and 
salary.  The  regulations  of  the  Public  Health  Service  provide 
for  the  periodic  promotion  of  the  noncommissioned  staff 
known  as  the  scientific  personnel,  which  is  divided  into  six 

*  In  the  examining  force  of  the  Patent  Office  is  encountered  a  system 
of  efficiency  records  and  competitive  examinations  which,  in  conjunction 
with  length  of  service,  are  actually  given  controlling  force  in  determining 
the  selection  for  advancement  from  one  grade  to  another.  The  grades,  in 
question,  however,  do  not  represent  changes  in  duty  but  merely  in  com- 
pensation rate,  and  the  system  in  question,  therefore,  is  not  regarded  as 
a  system  of  selection  for  promotion  but  merely  as  one  of  selection  for 
increase  of  compensation  and  is  accordingly  discussed  in  a  subsequent 
chapter  dealing  with  that  subject. 


312  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

classes.  Promotions  from  Class  VI  through  the  intermediate 
grades  to  Class  III  are  made  after  certain  years  of  service 
and  after  passing  a  satisfactory  examination.  Promotions  to 
Classes  II  and  I  are  made  only  when  a  vacancy  exists  and  after 
a  review  of  the  officer's  record  by  a  board  of  regular  com- 
missioned medical  ofBcers.  Within  each  grade  the  promotions 
are  governed  by  seniority.  As  in  the  case  of  the  commissioned 
officers  the  promotions  do  not  represent  selection  for  advance- 
ment but  merely  the  attainment  of  a  higher  rank  and  salary. 

With  the  minor  exceptions  just  reviewed,  therefore,  it  may 
be  said  that  the  system  of  selection  for  promotion  now  pre- 
vailing in  the  federal  service  is  that  of  substantially  complete 
discretion  in  the  hands  of  the  administrative  officers,  qualified 
only  in  the  competitive  service  by  the  requirement  of  a  qualify- 
ing examination  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  where  the 
entrance  tests  for  the  position  to  which  promotion  is  proposed 
are  substantially  different  from  those  which  the  employee 
passed  in  obtaining  his  existing  civil  service  status.  The 
promotion  system  thus  presents  a  strong  contrast  to  the  re- 
cruitment system  prevailing  over  the  major  portion  of  the 
service.  As  opposed  to  that  system  it  offers  but  few  and  weak 
safeguards,  in  the  shape  of  restrictive  law  or  surveillance  by 
the  Civil  Service  Commission,  against  the  entrance  of  politi- 
cal considerations  or  of  personal  favoritism. 

In  the  absence  of  such  safeguards,  it  is  important  to  de- 
termine the  extent  to  which  such  improper  elements  actually 
enter  in  the  promotion  process.  Such  information  is  neces- 
sarily preliminary  to  any  discussion  of  the  need  for  additional 
safeguards  in  this  direction. 

Political  or  Other  Improper  Influence  in  Selection  for 
Promotion. — It  has  been  pointed  out  that  the  two  major 
factors  in  the  federal  personnel  system  which  make  for  the 
persistence  of  political  considerations  in  personnel  matters  are : 
the  political  selection  of  the  higher  administrative  officers; 
and  the  intervention  in  personnel  matters  of  politicians  out- 
side of  the  service,  and  more  particularly  of  members  of  Con- 
gress.    Were  both  these   factors  eliminated,   that  is  to  say, 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  313 

were  the  administrative  officers  and  all  subordinate  employees 
throughout  the  services  selected  on  the  basis  of  merit,  and 
were  an  effective  embargo  placed  upon  attempts  by  persons 
outside  the  service  to  influence  the  action  of  administrative 
officers  in  personnel  matters,  the  need  for  guarding  against 
the  intrusion  of  political  considerations  in  promotion  would 
virtually  disappear.  So  long  as  these  obvious  steps  for  the 
exclusion  of  political  considerations  from  the  personnel  ad- 
ministration of  the  federal  government  remain  to  be  taken, 
the  possibility  of  political  influence  as  affecting  promotion  is 
one  which  must  be  reckoned  with.  To  meet  it  appropriate  re- 
strictions upon  administrative  discretion  must  be  devised  of  a 
form  and  extent  proportionate  to  the  danger  thought  to  exist. 

It  is  unfortunate  that  the  facts  regarding  this  matter  are 
extremely  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to  obtain;  and,  where 
obtained,  necessarily  have  application  only  to  the  particular 
branch  of  the  service  covered.  Any  attempt  to  appraise,  in 
quantitative  terms,  the  extent  to  which  considerations,  other 
than  those  of  the  good  of  the  service,  actually  enter,  or  gov- 
ern in  the  manifold  divisions  and  services  of  the  federal 
service,  would  obviously  be  futile.  There  is  no  method  avail- 
able to  the  individual  inquirer  of  getting  at  the  facts  or  any 
significant  portion  of  them. 

In  1899,  the  Civil  Service  Commission  commented  as  fol- 
lows on  the  situation  then  existing  with  reference  to  the 
intrusion  of  political  or  other  improper  considerations  In  selec- 
tion for  promotion : 

At  the  time  of  the  organization  of  the  Commission  the  need 
of  promotion  regulations  was  considered  so  Important  that 
in  its  first  report  the  following  language  was  used : 

The  principal  causes  of  unjust  promotions,  in  the  absence 
of  examinations,  are  ( i )  importunate  solicitation  and  coer- 
cive influence  from  the  outside,  and  (2)  prejudice,  favoritism, 
or  corruption  on  the  part  of  the  appointing  officers.  We  need 
not  stop  to  Inquire  which  class  of  these  abuses  is  the  most  fre- 
quent or  pernicious.  .  .  .  The  outside  Interference  Is  far  more 
Indefensible,  if  not  more  pernicious,  in  regard  to  promotions 
than   In  regard  to  original  adrnlssions,   for   the  Importunate 


314  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

backer  of  a  new  man  may  perhaps  know  something  of  the 
merits  of  the  friend  he  pushes;  but  it  is  sheer  presumption  for 
an  outsider,  ignorant  as  he  must  be  of  the  duties  of  those  in 
a  bureau,  to  assume  to  instruct  the  officer  at  the  head  as  to  the 
merits  of  those  who  have  served  under  him  for  years.  Never- 
theless, and  in  plain  repugnance  to  the  spirit  of  the  tenth  sec- 
tion of  the  civil  service  act,  the  duty  of  promoting  is  now 
seriously  embarrassed  by  solicitations  and  the  coercive  influ- 
ence of  persons  having  no  right  of  interference  nor  means  of 
judging  of  the  usefulness  of  the  candidate. 

This  subject  is  so  closely  related  to  good  administration 
that  it  has  since  been  discussed  in  nearly  all  of  the  later  reports 
of  the  Commission.  While  the  civil  service  act  provides  for 
promotion  examinations,  and  provisions  to  this  efifect  were  in- 
cluded in  previous  civil  service  rules,  practically  no  progress 
was  made  in  putting  general  promotion  regulations  into  force 
until  1896,  when  the  Commission  suggested  that  a  rule  gov- 
erning promotions  be  incorporated  in  the  revised  rules.  Rule 
XI  was  accordingly  promulgated  by  the  President,  and  the 
Commission  thereupon  proceeded  to  formulate  promotion  regu- 
lations, which  were  submitted  to  the  several  Departments. 
Promotion  regulations  have  been  adopted  by  some  of  the  De- 
partments while  others  have  thus  far  taken  no  action  on  the 
suggestions  of  the  Commission,  As  appointments  to  classi- 
fied positions  are  now  made  as  a  result  of  tests  of  fitness  and 
without  regard  to  influence,  it  has  followed  that  the  influence 
which  was  formerly  exercised  to  control  appointments  as  well 
as  promotions  is  now  directed  to  the  control  of  promotions, 
in  the  absence  of  regulations  requiring  that  they  shall  be  made 
only  upon  merit. 

It  is  to  be  regretted  that  more  progress  has  not  been  made 
toward  adopting  promotion  regulations.  .  .  .  Promotion  regu- 
lations cannot  be  put  into  force  as  required  under  the  civil 
service  act  and  rules  without  the  full  cooperation  of  the  officers 
in  the  dififerent  branches  of  the  service,  and  it  is  deemed  proper 
to  state  that  the  Commission  has  not  met  with  that  cooperation 
which  is  necessary  to  a  fulfillment  of  the  requirements  of  the 
law  in  this  respect.  It  is  hoped  that  the  need  of  promotion 
regulations,  which  has  already  been  recognized  in  a  number 
of  the  branches  of  the  service,  will  result  in  their  being  put 
into  operation  throughout  the  entire  service,  so  that  promotions 
may  be  made  only  upon  merit. ^ 

*  Sixteenth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1899),  P-  13. 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  315 

This  statement  represents  the  most  recent  positive  char- 
acterization by  the  Commission  of  the  actual  condition  with 
respect  to  pohtical  pressure  in  promotions.  In  1906,  the  Com- 
mission stated  that  "while  it  is  undoubtedly  true  that  a 
bureau  chief  or  the  head  of  any  office  may  be  able  to  decide 
better  than  any  examination  can  the  relative  fitness  of  em- 
ployees in  his  office,  it  is  unfortunate  that  he  is  not  always 
allowed  to  exercise  that  discretion  unhampered,  owing  to  pres- 
sure exerted  by  outside  influence.''  ^  Except  for  this  some- 
what intangible  characterization,  the  Commission,  though  it 
has  on  several  occasions  discussed  the  problem  of  promotion 
methods,  has  never  ventured,  since  its  report  of  1899  just 
quoted,  any  direct  statement  as  to  the  extent  to  which  political 
or  other  improper  elements  actually  enter  into  selection  for  pro- 
motion. 

As  has  been  set  forth  already,  where  the  problem  of -the- 
elimination  of  political  consideration  from  selection  is  con- 
sidered, the  postal  service  has  been  historically  the  chief  con- 
cern of  the  civil  service  reformer.  The  process  by  which  the 
system  of  competitive  selection  has  gradually  been  extended 
over  virtually  the  whole  of  the  enormous  personnel  of  that 
service  has  been  traced  in  some  detail.  It  is  all  the  more  re- 
markable that  there  has  been  so  little  development  in  this  great 
service  toward  a  formalization  of  the  methods  of  selection  for 
promotion,  so  as  to  insure  the  elimination  of  political  considera- 
tions and  to  promote  the  morale  of  the  service.  In  a  subse- 
quent chapter  mention  will  be  made  of  the  methods  now  in 
force  in  the  postal  service  and  in  the  railway  mail  service  for 
controlling  increases  of  salary  within  grades.  All  those  meth- 
ods have  reference,  however,  solely  to  the  increase  of  salary 
within  grades  or  within  a  given  class  of  positions.  So  far 
as  present  information  shows,  no  progress  has  been  made  for 
the  development  of  similar  methods  in  determining  selection 
for  promotion;  that  is,  for  example,  for  determining  which  of 
a  number  of  clerks  shall  be  made  superintendent  of  mails,  or 

'Twenty-third  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion (1906),  p.  5. 


3i6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

superintendent  of  deliveries  in  a  city  post  office;  or,  which  of 
a  number  of  senior  foremen  in  the  railway  mail  service  shall 
be  made  a  division  superintendent.  In  the  absence  of  such 
formal  methods,  it  is  probable  that  the  political  tradition  which 
so  long  dominated  the  postal  service  has  not  been  entirely 
eliminated  in  this  field.  That  some  consideration  is  still  given 
to  politics  in  this  service  would  seem  to  be  frankly  recognized 
by  President  Wilson's  Order  of  February  i6,  1917,^  providing 
that,  in  the  promotion  of  postal  employees  to  the  position 
of  Post  Office  Inspector,  the  Postmaster  General  should  ap- 
portion the  promotions  fairly  between  the  two  chief  political 
parties. 

The  evidence  available  points  to  the  same  conclusion,  as 
would  be  suggested  a  priori,  that  the  extent  to  which  political 
considerations  control  promotions  varies  w-idely  in  the  several 
services.  In  some  branches,  especially  those  where  the  work 
is  distinctly  scientific  and  technical,  the  discretion  allowed  in 
no  wise  has  been  abused  but  has  been  governed  uniformly  by 
considerations  directed  solely  to  the  good  of  the  service.  In 
the  other  branches  political  influence  undoubtedly  plays  no 
small  part.  Nevertheless,  it  would  seem  fair  to  say  that, 
although  existing  conditions  point  to  the  need  of  some  meas- 
ure of  limitation  on  the  discretion  of  administration  officers 
to  prevent  the  intrusion  of  political  considerations  in  promotion, 
the  situation  does  not  call  for  any  such  rigidity  or  restrictive 
procedure  as  has  been  applied  in  the  case  of  recruitment. 

A  need  undoubtedly  exists,  varying  widely  from  one  branch 
of  the  service  to  another,  and  from  one  class  of  employees 
to  another,  for  formal  methods  of  promotion.  The  employ- 
ment of  such  methods  is,  as  has  been  pointed  out,  inherently 
desirable  in  order  to  improve  the  morale  of  the  service.  The 
question  remaining  is  to  ascertain  the  extent  to  which  it  is 
actually  practicable  to  devise  formal  methods  that  will  result 
in  the  promotion  of  the  most  deserving  and  best  qualified.  To 
that  inquiry  the  remainder  of  this  chapter  is  devoted. 

*  Thirty-fourth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion (1917),  p.  118. 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  317 

The  Technical  Problem  of  Formal  Promotion  Methods. — 
The  devising  of  formal  methods  of  selection  for  promotion 
which  shall  effectively  pick  out  the  best  qualified  is  one  of 
the  most  difficult  problems  in  the  whole  field  of  personnel 
administration.  The  difficulties  are  far  greater  than  those  en- 
countered in  devising  formal  methods  of  recruitment;  and  the 
consequences  of  improper  selection  far  more  serious.  If  the 
methods  of  recruitment  result  in  the  selection  of  a  less  capable 
as  against  a  more  capable  applicant,  the  fact  is  known,  if  at 
all,  only  to  the  few  concerned  in  the  work  of  recruitment.  But 
if  promotion  methods  fail,  the  fact  is  known  to  all  the  per- 
sonnel affected,  and,  more  surely  and  universally  than  any 
other  defect  in  personnel  methods,  breeds  discontent,  diminu- 
tion of  incentive,  and  general  impairment  of  morale.  The 
necessity  for  not  merely  efficient  but  for  highly  accurate 
methods  of  selection  is  thus  substantially  more  important  in 
promotion  than  in  recruitment;  and  from  this  it  results  that 
rigid  or  mechanical  methods  can  be  much  less  confidently  and 
generally  employed  than  in  recruitment. 

Once  it  is  determined  to  restrict  in  any  way  the  discretion 
of  the  administrative  officer  in  the  making  of  selection  for  pro- 
motions and  to  draft  regulations  giving  effect  to  such  restric- 
tions, a  logical  and  comprehensive  classification  of  the  service 
becomes  essential.  In  the  first  place,  what  change  of  duties  con- 
stitutes a  promotion  as  distinguished  from  a  mere  reassign- 
ment must  be  defined,  and  even  this  primary  decision  may 
be  fraught  with  great  difficulty  if  no  well  thought  out  scheme 
of  titles  and  no  clearly  expressed  definitions  of  the  duties  ap- 
plicable to  each  title  has  been  prepared.  Again,  it  is  neces- 
sary in  formulating  such  regulations  to  determine  the  positions 
from  among  which  selection  for  promotion  to  any  given 
vacancy  shall  be  permissible;  and  this  again  is  obviously  diffi- 
cult unless  the  several  types  of  work  have  been  clearly  dis- 
tinguished by  appropriate  titles  and  descriptions  of  duties. 
Indeed,  unless  such  clear  dififerentiation  and  designation  exists, 
it  is  impossible  even  to  tell  when  a  given  change  in  duties  is 
in  fact  a  promotion  requiring  the  application  of  a  promotion 


3i8  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

procedure.  To  the  failure  to  develop  a  \vorkable  classification 
of  employments  in  the  federal  service  is  due,  in  large  measure, 
the  failure  to  develop  any  ordered  promotional  procedure. 
Types  of  Formal  Methods  of  Promotion. — At  least  four 
types  of  formal  methods  of  selection  for  promotion  may  be 
distinguished  clearly:  seniority;  competitive  examination;  ef- 
ficiency records;  and  the  method  which  mingles  with  or  sub- 
stitutes for  the  judgment  of  the  administrative  superior,  the 
judgment  of  an  administrative  board.  In  the  first  three  the 
play  of  judgment  is  qualified  partially  or  wholly  by  factors  of 
a  mathematical  or  rigid  character,  whereas  in  the  fourth  the 
number  of  minds  brought  to  bear  on  the  problem  is  greater 
but  no  mechanical  method  is  employed.  Any  two  or  more  of 
these  four  methods  may  be  employed,  of  course,  in  combina- 
tion. 

Seniority. — As  is  well  known,  the  promotion  system  of  mil- 
itary services,  in  respect  to  commissioned  officers,  is  one  based 
primarily  on  the  principle  of  seniority,  qualified  by  non-com- 
petitive examination  at  certain  points.^  Until  fairly  recently 
the  same  system  was  used  in  the  naval  service.  In  the  civil 
establishments  a  similar  system  is  found  in  the  commissioned 
officers  and  scientific  personnel  of  the  Public  Health  Service 
and  the  commissioned  officers  of  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Sur- 
vey. In  neither  of  these  services  does  the  system  of  promotion 
by  seniority  extend  to  the  higher  ranks.  In  the  Public  Health 
Service  the  assistant  surgeons  general  are  chosen  by  the  Sur- 
geon General  from  among  the  commissioned  officers  above  the 
grade  of  assistant  surgeon,  the  lowest  rank.  The  Surgeon 
General  is  selected  by  the  President  without  restriction,  al- 
though it  has  been  the  practice  to  appoint  an  officer  of  the 
Service,  In  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  the  assistant  direc- 
tor is  designated  by  the  Secretary  of  Commerce  on  the  recom- 
mendation of  the  Director,  from  among  the  hydrographic  and 

^  The  question  of  the  substitution  or  qualification  of  the  system  of 
seniority  promotion  in  the  regular  army  by  a  system  of  selection  by 
boards  of  superior  officers  has  been  agitated  recently  before  Congressional 
committees.  Military  opinion,  as  expressed  by  the  higher  officers,  appears 
to  be  fairly  evenly  divided  on  the  question. 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  319 

geodetic  engineers — the  highest  rank  below  that  of  Assistant 
Director.  The  Director  must  be  selected  from  among  the 
officers  of  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  not  Ijelow  the  rank 
of  commander.^  Despite  these  qualifications  the  system  of 
promotion  in  the  Public  Health  Service  and  the  Coast  and 
Geodetic  Survey  is  basically  one  of  seniority.  The  considera- 
tion given  to  this  factor  in  the  military  services  and  the  Public 
Health  Service  and  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  is  sugges- 
tive of  the  possibility  that,  in  a  hierarchically  organized,  homo- 
geneous professional  service,  in  which  care  is  exercised  in  the 
initial  recruitment,  the  system  of  promotion  by  seniority  is 
not  without  merit.- 

The  arguments  in  favor  of  this  system  are :  that  the  length 
of  service  of  employees  determines  in  great  part  their  techni- 
cal qualifications;  that  under  this  system  internal  strife  for 
advancement  is  eliminated;  that  those  responsible  for  making 
promotions  are  relieved  from  political  or  other  outside  pressure, 
and  the  feeling  that  is  engendered  in  the  service  that  promo- 
tions are  being  made  with  an  even-handed  justice  tends  to 
promote  good  feeling  and  thus  promote  general  morale.  It  is 
held,  furthermore,  that  the  greater  certainty  of  promotion  that 

*  The  Act  of  May  22,  1917  (40  Stat.  88)  provides  that  hydrographic 
and  geodetic  engineers  receiving  $3,000  or  more  but  less  than  $4,000  shall 
rank  with  commanders  in  the  Navy. 

'  In  appraising  the  success  which  the  system  of  promotion  by  senior- 
ity has  achieved  in  the  Public  Health  Service,  it  must  always  be  borne 
in  mind  that  that  system  is  not  properly  speaking,  a  system  of  promo- 
tion but  rather  a  system  of  advancement  in  rank  and  salary.  The  advance- 
ment of  an  officer  to  a  higher  rank  does  not  of  necessity  involve  a  change 
in  his  duties  and  conversely  the  assignment  of  a  member  of  the  service 
to  duties  which  are  actually  in  the  nature  of  a  promotion,  except  in  the 
two  highest  grades,  does  not  involve  any  advancement  in  rank  or  compen- 
sation. It  may  consequently  be  said  that  the  system  of  promotion  in  the 
Public  Health  Service  is  in  large  measure  different  from  that  obtaining 
in  the  other  civil  branches  in  that  promotion  in  that  service  does  not 
involve  necessarily  any  change  in  duties.  The  net  result  of  this  situation 
is  that  the  executive  of  the  service  has  a  large  measure  of  discretion  if 
not  a  free  hand,  in  selecting  for  any  particular  position  which  may  become 
vacant  in  the  service  any  of  the  great  number  of  members  of  the  service 
of  the  appropriate  grade.  Moreover,  as  has  been  pointed  out  already, 
once  the  level  is  reached  in  the  Public  Health  Service  where  advancement 
in  rank  implies  also  a  definite  advancement  in  the  type  of  duties,  namely, 
the  rank  of  Assistant  Surgeon  General,  and  Surgeon  General  the  system 
is  entirely  one  of  free  selection  (or,  as  it  is  called,  "detail"  in  the  case  of 
the  Assistant  Surgeons'  General  and  "nomination"  by  the  President  in  the 
case  of  the  Surgeon  General). 


320  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

is  held  out  to  the  individual  employee  attracts  a  better  class 
of  men  to  the  service  and  retains  in  the  service  many  valuable 
employees  who  would  otherwise  leave  it. 

The  obvious  evil  of  a  system  of  promotion  by  seniority 
is  that  it  does  not  bring  the  best  material  to  the  top,  that  the 
young  and  brilliant  member  of  the  service  is  kept  in  a  subor- 
dinate capacity  for  an  undue  period,  while  older  members,  of 
less  ability,  fill  the  higher  places.  The  proper  application  of 
the  system  of  promotion  by  seniority  carries  with  it,  as  a  nec- 
essary premise,  that  all  employees  below  a  superior  standard 
of  efihciency  will  be  ruthlessly  eliminated  from  the  service  lest 
they,  in  due  course  of  time,  reach  the  higher  posts  for  which 
they  are  not  Cjualified;  or,  barring  this,  that  use  is  made  of 
efihciency  records  or  pass  examinations  in  determining  whether 
the  principle  shall  apply  in  each  particular  case.  If  the  stand- 
ards of  entrance  are  high  and  raise  at  least  a  presumption  of  ca- 
pacity for  promotion,  selection  by  seniority,  with  proper  safe- 
guards, may  be  resorted  to;  but  if  the  conditions  of  the  service 
require  that  large  numbers  of  subordinates  must  be  recruited 
who  do  not  necessarily  have  to  possess  qualifications  for 
advanced  responsibility,  such  a  system  could  only  be  disastrous. 
The  Public  Health  Service  is  an  illustration  of  the  first  type, 
and  only  because  it  satisfies  that  description  so  completely  does 
the  system  of  promotion  by  seniority  in  that  service  work  so 
successfully.  On  the  other  hand,  the  clerical  employments  in 
the  departments  at  Washington  or  in  the  postal  service  furnish 
an  illustration  of  the  second  type.  No  presumption  whatever  is 
warranted  that  the  ordinary  clerk  possesses  a  sufficient  measure 
of  executive  ability  to  justify  his  promotion  by  mere  seniority 
to  a  post  of  even  intermediate  executive  responsibility. 

The  prevailing  practice  regarding  the  elimination  of  the 
inefficient,  including  those  whose  inefficiency  is  due  merely 
to  superannuation,  is  thus  a  factor  influencing  the  effective- 
ness of  a  system  of  promotion  solely  or  chiefly  by  seniority. 
Where  the  rigid  elimination  of  the  inefficient  does  not  prevail 
promotion  by  seniority  frequently  elevates  to  higher  rank  per- 
sons below  a  reasonable  standard  of  efficiency.     Particularly 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  321 

will  this  be  so  with  respect  to  persons  whose  efficiency  has  been 
impaired  through  superannuation,  as  they  will  have,  in  most 
cases,  a  longer  record  of  service  than  their  juniors.  A  system 
of  promotion  by  seniority  is  to  be  thought  of,  therefore,  only 
where  a  fairly  severe  policy  prevails  in  respect  to  elimination 
of  the  unlit.  The  policy  in  most  branches  of  the  federal  service 
is  one  of  undue  liberality,  or  even  timidity,  on  the  part  of 
administrative  officers,  in  this  respect.  Under  present  condi- 
tions, therefore,  the  method  of  promotion  based  solely  or 
even  largely  upon  seniority  can  be  recommended  only  for  a 
very  few  places  in  the  federal  service. 

Except  in  the  Public  Health  Service,  in  the  examining  force 
of  the  Patent  Office,  and  in  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Sur- 
vey, seniority  has  not,  so  far  as  the  writer  has  knowledge, 
been  a  controlling  influence  in  making  promotions.  In  all 
other  branches  of  the  service  seniority  is  merely  one  of  the 
many  factors  which  the  selecting  officer  may  take  into  consid- 
eration, giving  it  such  weight  as  he  sees  fit.  Although  no 
binding  regulations  or  standards  have  been  established,  a  very 
strong  tradition  has  grown  up  in  not  a  few  governmental 
organizations,  however,  which  awards  to  seniority  a  very  heavy 
weight  in  determining  promotion.  This  tradition  of  seniority 
in  promotion  perhaps  flourishes  most  in  those  departments 
which  have  gained  a  reputation  for  stagnation  and  inefficient 
administration.  It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say  that  this  condi- 
tion is  almost  wholly  bad.  Except  in  the  few  special  cases 
that  have  been  mentioned,  and  under  the  safeguards  thus  pro- 
vided, consideration  should  only  be  given  to  seniority  when 
other  determining  factors  are  substantially  equal. 

Efficiency  Record. — When  the  attempt  is  made  to  reduce 
to  order  a  promotion  procedure  previously  wholly  informal, 
resort  is  almost  invariably  had  to  "efficiency  records."  Ordi- 
narily a  scheme  of  this  kind  takes  the  form  of  a  periodic  rating 
or  appraisal,  by  superior  officers,  of  all  the  employees  under 
their  jurisdiction,  with  respect  to  certain  fixed  elements,  and 
in  more  or  less  closely  prescribed  terms. 

An  administrative  officer  entrusted  with  complete  discre- 


322  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

tion  in  making  selection  for  promotion,  as  has  been  said,  may 
maintain  an  efficiency  record  and  use  it  merely  as  a  guide  in 
exercising  his  unrestricted  discretion ;  and  it  is  perhaps  gratui- 
tous to  urge  that  every  administrative  officer  entrusted  with 
such  discretion,  or  with  discretion  in  personnel  matters  gen- 
erally, and  having  any  considerable  number  of  employees  under 
supervision,  should  maintain  such  records  as  a  check  against 
lapses  of  memory  and  against  the  danger  of  exaggerating  the 
importance  of  recent  as  against  long  time  impressions.  Such 
records  also  furnish  the  administrative  officer  a  strong  weapon 
for  resisting  improper  pressure  which  may  be  brought  tO'  bear 
upon  him  on  behalf  of  one  or  more  of  the  persons  eligible 
for  promotion. 

The  maintenance  of  such  records,  however,  does  not  in 
anywise  change  the  essential  character  of  the  system  of  promo- 
tion, which  is  still  one  of  unrestricted  discretion.  Only  when 
such  records  are  given  an  official  status,  and  are  made  definite 
and  recognized  factors  in  promotion,  is  the  nature  of  the  pro- 
motion system  affected.  The  efficiency  record  then  becomes 
a  controlling  restriction  upon  the  discretion  of  the  administra- 
tive officer.  The  extent  of  that  restriction  will  be  measured 
by  the  weight  attached  to  such  record  in  the  final  determination 
of  the  selection  for  promotion. 

If  any  form  of  restriction  upon  the  discretion  of  the  ad- 
ministrative officer  in  making  selection  for  promotion  is  to  be 
imposed,  the  use  of  efficiency  records  is  obviously  one  that 
commends  itself  as  most  nearly  approaching  the  result  which 
would  be  obtained  by  the  honest,  unrestricted  exercise  of  such 
discretion.  Indeed  the  determination  of  promotion  by  effi- 
ciency records  currently  maintained  is,  in  ideal  theory,  not  a 
limitation  on  the  discretion  of  the  administrative  officer  in 
selection  for  promotion  but  is  merely  a  guide  to  him.  If  the 
efficiency  records  are  correctly  designed  and  properly  main- 
tained, the  individual  whom  they  indicate  as  properly  in  line 
for  promotion  should  be  the  same  as  the  one  who  would  be 
selected  by  the  unshackled  judgment  of  the  administrative 
superior  when  that-  judgment  is  based,  as  it  should  be,  upon 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  323 

a  full  knowledge  of  all  the  facts  of  past  performance  of  the  sev- 
eral employees  from  among  whom  selection  must  be  made. 
The  record  thus  serves  at  once  as  a  guide  to  the  administra- 
tive officer,  and  as  an  impartial  and  irrefutable  indication  of 
the  soundness  of  his  choice. 

Needless  to  say,  this  beneficent  theoretical  function  of  the 
efficiency  record  cannot  be  realized  fully  in  practice.  The 
several  obstacles,  well  nigh  insurmountable,  which  stand  in 
the  way  of  even  its  imperfect  realization  will  warrant  full  ex- 
amination. 

In  considering  the  problem  of  devising  proper  efficiency 
records  for  the  federal  service  for  use  in  promotion,  and  of 
securing  their  proper  maintenance,  it  is  important  at  the  out- 
set to  take  note  of  the  notion  which  is  very  commonly  held 
with  reference  to  this  subject,  namely  that  uniformity,  over 
the  whole  service,  in  methods  of  rating  efficiency  is  desirable. 
In  its  report  for  19 10  the  Civil  Service  Commission  stated  ^ 
that  "a  uniform  system  of  estimating  and  recording  the  rela- 
tive efficiency  of  employees"  should  be  adopted,  and  state- 
ments of  similar  import  are  to  be  found  in  other  reports  of 
the  Commission.  If  this  means,  as  it  seems  to,  that  the  same, 
or  substantially  the  same,  records  should  be  employed  through- 
out the  service,  embracing  the  same  factors  and  terms  of  rat- 
ing uniformly  weighted,  it  is  difficult,  in  the  light  of  the  ex- 
perience with  efficiency  record  systems  in  other  jurisdictions, 
to  agree  with  the  Commission. 

So  far  as  experience  may  be  used  with  confidence  to  fur- 
nish any  lessons  regarding  efficiency  records,  it  has  demon- 
strated the  immense  difficulty,  if  not  the  impossibility,  of  apply- 
ing to  a  large  and  varied  service  a  uniform  system.  In  most 
cases  where  an  attempt  has  been  made  to  cover  a  large  service 
by  a  comprehensive  system  of  efficiency  records,  the  central 
agency,  usually  the  civil  service  commission,  has  made  the  ef- 
fort to  impose  upon,  or  at  least  to  hand  down  to,  the  whole 
service  a  ready  made  system.     A  single  central  body  naturally 

*  Twenty-seventh  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion (1910),  p.  28. 


324  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

attempts  in  such  an  outgiving  to  ai)ply  a  single  uniform  system 
to  the  whole  service.  The  almost  uniform  failure  of  this  pro- 
cedure seems  conclusive  proof  that  the  method  is  wrong  in 
principle. 

Failure  indeed  might  have  been  predicted  from  the  nature 
of  the  case.  A  system  of  efficiency  records,  like  any  other 
device  of  personnel  administration,  or  of  administration  gen- 
erally, so  far  as  possible,  should  be  indigenous  in  the  soil  in 
which  it  is  to  flourish.  Concretely  what  is  needed  in  so  large 
and  varied  a  service  as  the  federal  government  is  not  the  im- 
position from  above  of  a  system  elaborated  in  the  closet,  but 
the  development,  by  the  administrative  officers  directly  con- 
cerned in  each  branch  of  the  service,  of  a  system  of  records 
that,  in  their  judgment,  meets  their  peculiar  needs.  In  this 
development  they  should  have  the  assistance  of  a  central 
agency  competent  to  criticize  and  suggest,  and  the  benefit  of  co- 
operation and  interchange  of  suggestion  among  the  officers 
whose  problems  are  similar  or  related ;  but  the  development, 
nevertheless,  should  be  from  the  periphery  of  the  service 
toward  the  center,  rather  than  contrariwise. 

One  reason  why  in  some  jurisdictions  it  has  been  thought 
necessary  to  extend  a  uniform  system  throughout  the  whole 
service  is  that  transfers  from  one  organization  unit  to  an- 
other are  rather  freely  permitted ;  and  consequently  it  be- 
comes necessary,  when  an  employee  is  transferred,  to  take  into 
consideration  in  any  subsequent  promotions  or  other  matters 
for  which  efficiency  records  are  employed,  the  record  made  by 
him  in  the  department  from  which  he  came.  Obviously,  unless 
that  record  was  made  in  terms  equivalent  to  or  uniform  with 
those  employed  in  the  records  of  the  department  to  which  he 
is  transferred,  confusion  and  difficulty  result.  Real  as  this 
consideration  is,  the  number  of  cases  involving  transfer  from 
one  department  to  another  in  the  federal  service  are  probably 
not  sufficiently  numerous  to  warrant  laying  so  much  stress 
as  has  commonly  been  laid  in  public  personnel  systems  on  the 
necessity  for  uniformity  in  efficiency  record  systems  as  between 
departments.    The  case  of  the  transferred  employee  may  well 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  325 

be  taken  care  of  by  re-valuation  of  his  record  in  the  terms 
of  the  record  used  in  the  department  to  which  he  is  trans- 
ferred. In  any  case,  the  desirabihty  of  uniformity  for  this 
purpose  extends  only  to  records  designed  for  the  same  kind 
of  work.  Under  no  consideration  can  a  clerk  be  transferred 
to  the  position  of  physician,  or  vice  versa;  hence,  under  no 
circumstances  can  a  situation  arise  where  it  is  necessary  or 
even  desirable  that  the  records  of  the  two  employees  be  ex- 
pressed in  like  or  equivalent  terms.  Failure  to  appreciate  this 
simple  fact  has,  been  responsible  for  endless  difficulty  in  the 
construction  and  maintenance  of  efficiency  record  systems. 

The  report  of  the  Reclassification  Commission  clearly  rec- 
ognizes this  principle.  The  system  of  records  it  recommends 
can,  it  declares,^ 

be  as  varied  in  character  as  the  needs  of  the  dififerent  organ- 
izations and  lines  of  work  require.  Obviously  no  single  sys- 
tem can  be  devised  that  will  be  applicable  to  the  entire  serv- 
ice. Moreover,  in  the  present  formative  stage  of  efficiency 
rating  systems  it  is  highly  desirable  that  considerable  latitude 
be  allowed  for  experimentation  with  different  systems,  even 
in  the  same  or  similar  lines  of  work. 

The  Commission  does  state,  however :  "that  in  order  to 
secure  uniformity  and  to  give  each  organization  the  benefit 
of  the  experience  of  others,  the  general  supervision  of  some 
central  agency  is  necessary,"  and  that  "full  authority  to  in- 
stall efficiency  rating  systems  and  to  provide  for  their  applica- 
tion in  such  ways  as  it  may  deem  wise  should  be  given  to  the 
Civil  Service  Commission,  which  would  naturally  seek  the 
fullest  cooperation  of  the  various  departments  in  the  prosecu- 
tion of  the  work."  This  central  authority,  it  is  believed,  should 
take  the  form  of  providing  that  an  adequate  system  is  estab- 
lished by  each  service  rather  than  by  prescribing  the  details 
of  such  system.  Only  when  services  performing  substantially 
the  same  kinds  of  work  fail  to  agree  upon  a  uniform  system 
should  any  compulsory  power  on  the  part  of  the  Commission 
be  exerted. 

*  Report  of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  Part  I,  p.  121, 


326  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

In  examining  into  the  values  and  limitations  of  the  effici- 
ency record  as  a  method  of  determining  selection  for  promo- 
tion, it  is  essential  to  appreciate  that  no  system  of  records  can 
be  substituted  for  human  judgment;  that  where  the  relative 
merits  of  individuals  as  workers,  or  their  relative  fitness  for 
advanced  responsibility,  can  be  determined  only  by  the  ex- 
ercise of  judgment,  a  record  cannot  displace  such  judgment; 
it  can  merely  record  it. 

In  certain  employments  it  is  possible  indeed  to  establish 
and  maintain  current  records  of  work  accomplished,  not  only 
as  to  quantity  but  even  as  to  quality,  in  terms  of  errors  made, 
materials  or  forms  spoiled,  etc.  It  must  be  evident,  however, 
without  much  elaboration,  that  the  field  in  which  this  kind  of 
record  can  be  employed  is  very  limited  and,  moreover,  it  is 
the  one  in  which  the  least  difficulty  is  experienced,  even  in  the 
absence  of  records,  in  making  promotions.  The  real  difficulty 
in  placing  any  check  upon  the  discretion  of  an  administrative 
officer  occurs  in  those  lines  of  work  in  which  the  value  of  an 
employee  is  not  measurable  in  terms  of  quantity  or  any  other 
element  and  consequently  must  be  appraised  on  the  basis  of 
the  administrative  officer's  judgment. 

In  some  discussions  of  efficiency  records  much  has  been 
made  of  the  desirability  of  requiring  that  the  judgment  of 
the  rating  officer,  in  respect  to  employments  of  this  character, 
be  based  upon  "facts,"  as  evidenced  by  "supporting  records." 
When  this  principle  is  run  to  earth,  however,  it  is  found  that 
the  supporting  records  are  almost  invariably  themselves  mere 
expressions  of  opinion  on  the  part  of  the  rating  officer.  They 
may  indeed  be  expressions  of  opinion  of  specific  jobs  or  acts 
of  the  several  employees,  and  to  this  extent  they  unquestionably 
furnish  a  more  reliable  basis  for  rating,  and  for  reviewing 
ratings,  than  would  mere  general  opinions  covering  the  con- 
duct or  performance  of  the  several  employees  over  a  long 
period.  It  must  be  remembered,  however,  that  even  the  selec- 
tion by  the  rating  officer  of  certain  specific  acts  or  jobs  rather 
than  others,  for  praise  or  blame,  itself  represents  an  act 
of  judgment  of  a  very  fundamental  kind.     In  short,  as  to 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  32; 

employments  in  which  efficiency  or  capacity  is  not  capable  of 
objective  measurement,  and  such  employments  obviously  greatly 
preponderate  in  the  federal  service,  an  efficiency  record,  how- 
ever detailed,  can  in  no  wise  reduce  the  element  of  personal 
judgment.  It  can  and  should,  however,  help  to  eliminate  from 
that  judgment  all  factors  not  properly  entering  into  or  influ- 
encing it.  Slight  as  is  the  difficulty  which  most  rating  officers, 
like  other  men,  find  in  rationalizing  their  predilections,  the 
making  of  a  detailed  record  compels  periodically  a  whole- 
some self-examination  and  a  searching  of  heart  by  the  rating 
officer. 

The  necessity  of  taking  into  account  of  the  prospective 
capacity  of  an  employee  for  promotion  gives  rise  to  another 
of  the  cardinal  difficulties  in  the  design  and  administration  of 
efficiency  records.  So  great  is  this  difficulty  indeed  that  in 
many  systems  designed  to  serve  as  the  basis  for  promotion 
this  factor  is  entirely  left  out  of  consideration,  and  it 
is  presumably  assumed  that  an  employee  who  successfully 
carries  on  the  duties  of  his  present  position  possesses  the 
degree  and  type  of  capacity  requisite  for  a  position  of  higher 
grade.  How  incorrect  such  an  assumption  is  with  re- 
spect to  a  great  area  of  the  service  need  hardly  be  pointed 
out.  It  might  be  thought  that  the  difficulty  could  be  overcome 
readily  by  providing  in  the  record  that  the  rating  officer  shall 
make  a  periodical  estimate  under  this  head,  but  experience 
proves  that  it  is  next  to  impossible  to  obtain  from  rating  ofif- 
cers  periodically  a  reasoned  and  considered  judgment  on  a 
question  necessarily  remote  in  its  application  and  in  some 
cases  not  likely  ever  to  be  used. 

In  many  services  and  organization  units  promotions  do 
not  follow  a  single  prescribed  line;  and  hence  an  employee 
reported  as  suitable  for  promotion  because  of  his  fitness  for 
one  line  might  be  much  less  suitable  for  promotion  in  another 
line  which  the  rating  officer  might  not  have  had  in  mind  at 
the  time  he  made  his  report. 

The  considerations  reviewed  up  to  this  point  are  applicable 
to  any  efficiency  record  to  which  a  definite  participation  in 


328  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

determining  selection  for  promotion  is  awarded,  irrespective 
of  its  form.  It  becomes  advisable  here,  however,  to  take  cog- 
nizance of  the  two  distinct  types  into  which  systems  of  effi- 
ciency records  fall.  In  the  first  type,  the  rating  officer  is 
called  upon  simply  to  frame  relative  ratings  for  the  several 
employees  under  his  jurisdiction.  The  system  may  require  him 
to  record  his  opinion  of  every  employee  with  respect  to  each 
of  several  selected  elements  or  factors  of  efficiency.  But  the 
determination  of  the  final  rating  lies  wholly  in  his  hands.  A 
system  of  this  kind  is  thus  in  no  degree  a  restriction  on  his 
freedom  in  arranging  the  employees  under  his  jurisdiction  in 
any  relative  order  he  may  desire.  The  record  is  merely  the 
arbitrary  formalized  expression,  in  percentages  or  letters,  of 
the  uncontrolled  judgment  of  the  rating  officer. 

For  this  reason,  those  responsible  for  the  formulation  of 
efficiency  records  have  generally  felt  that  the  system  should  go 
further — that  it  should  be  such  as  to  limit  the  freedom  of 
the  rating  officer  in  determining  the  order  of  the  several  em- 
ployees. Consequently,  these  designers  have  provided  systems 
in  which  the  several  factors  or  elements  of  efficiency,  upon 
which  rating  is  to  be  based,  are  expressly  enumerated;  the 
terms  in  which  the  ratings  on  each  of  them  may  be  expressed 
are  specified;  the  weight  to  be  assigned  each  such  factor  or 
element,  and  the  method  of  computing  the  final  rating  from 
the  ratings  on  the  several  factors  are  minutely  predetermined. 
The  rank  or  order  of  the  employees  is  then  determined  by 
the  final  rating.  This  system  is  open  to  serious  objections. 
It  is  to  be  questioned  whether  any  system  of  efficiency  records, 
in  which  the  final  grades  are  obtained  by  averaging  the  rat- 
ings given  on  specific  elements  or  factors,  even  though  such 
factors  have  been  weighted  with  specific  reference  to  each 
particular  position  or  class  of  service,  is  to  be  generally  rec- 
ommended. As  applied  to  large  groups  of  minor  employees, 
particularly  those  performing  routine  or  standardized  opera- 
tions in  which  the  elements  of  quality  or  self -direction  are 
insignificant,  and  in  which  work  results  are  readily  measur- 
able in  terms  of  quantity,  such  records  are  unquestionably  prac- 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  329 

ticable;  but  even  here  the  greatest  care  must  be  taken  in  the 
selection  of  factors,  terms,  and  weights  of  rating,  if  the  records 
are  to  reflect  the  actual  relative  values  of  the  services  of  the 
several  employees  rather  than  a  purely  arbitrary  appraisal  of 
those  values.^ 

For  employees  at  all  above  this  class,  where  any  subtler 
elements  of  efficiency  become  involved,  a  mechanical  system, 
if  not  wholly  impracticable,  is  so  fraught  with  difficulty  that 
it  should  not  be  applied  except  for  the  most  substantial  of 
reasons — as  to  destroy  a  deeply  rooted  tradition  and  practice 
of  political  influence  in  promotion,  or  the  belief  in  the  ex- 
istence of  such  a  practice. - 

In  summary  it  may  be  said  then  that  an  efficiency  record 
system,  which,  by  periodic  percentages  or  other  quantitative 
ratings  attempts  to  determine  mechanically  the  person  who  shall 
be  selected  for  promotion,  while  theoretically  attractive,  pre- 
sents such  great  difficulties  in  actual  operation  that  over  most 
of  the  service  it  cannot  be  relied  upon  to  select  for  promotion 
the  employees  actually  most  fit.  The  limit  of  practical  appli- 
cation of  efficiency  records  for  most  of  the  service  is  repre- 
sented by  a  system  in  which  the  rating  officer  is  required  to  ex- 
press periodically,  in  percentages  or  other  standard  relative 
terms,  his  judgment  of  the  relative  competency  of  the  employees 
under  his  judisdiction  in  their  present  duties  and  of  their  fit- 
ness for  promotion  to  the  next  higher  grade  in  the  same  class 
of  work,  or  to  the  position  immediately  above  in  the  direct  and 
usual  line  of  promotion,  such  records  to  be  ordinarily  control- 
ling upon  the  discretion  of  the  administrative  officer,  when 

*  For  an  illuminating  illustration  of  the  incorrect  relative  ratings  of 
a  group  of  employees  of  this  type  produced  by  a  system  in  which  the 
several  factors  and  weights  had  not  been  selected  wisely,  see  President's 
Commission  on  Economy  and  Efficiency,  Report  on  the  System  of  Effi- 
ciency Records  in  the   National   Bank  Redemption   Agency,    1913. 

*  Even  then  a  system  should  be  applied  only  after  careful  and  cau- 
tious experimentation.  It  is  not  the  least  of  the  difficulties  which  sur- 
round the  development  of  a  system  of  efficiency  records  that  once  such 
a  system  has  been  applied,  it  is  difficult  to  avoid  making  use  of  the  rat- 
ings produced,  however  mistaken  those  ratings  may  prove  the  whole 
rating  scheme  to  have  been.  Those  who  have  received  favorable  ratings, 
albeit  undeservingly,  feel,  not  unnaturally,  that  they  have  a  sort  of 
vested  interest  in  the  use  of  such  ratings  in  determining  subsequent  pro- 
motions. 


330  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

a  promotion  to  the  specific  grade  or  position  so  contemplated 
is  to  be  made. 

But  even  when  restricted  to  this  area  of  promotion,  tlie 
extent  to  which  the  efficiency  record  is  actually  to  control  in 
determining  selection  must  be  limited.  It  should  always  be 
open  to  the  administrative  officer  to  obtain  permission  from 
the  Civil  Service  Commission  to  set  aside  the  records  upon 
a  proper  showing  that  the  promotion  to  be  made,  although 
nominally  falling  within  the  class  of  the  promotion  contem- 
plated by  the  system,  does  not  actually  so  fall  owing  to  pe- 
culiar conditions  of  the  organizations  or  of  the  duties  to  be 
performed.  Again,  an  administrative  officer,  after  a  minimum 
period  in  office,  say  a  half-year,  should  be  permitted,  upon 
the  approval  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  to  disregard 
the  ratings  made  by  his  predecessor  in  office,  whose  admin- 
istrative incapacity,  as  reflected  in  those  judgments,  he  may 
indeed  have  been  called  in  to  supersede.  Such  a  privilege 
would  doubtless  but  rarely  be  invoked  by  an  administrative 
officer,  but  its  existence  would  seem  to  be  indispensable  if 
the  officer  is  to  be  held  responsible  for  the  work  under  his 
jurisdiction.^ 

Even  as  thus  qualified  and  limited,  the  system  described, 
while  capable  of  practical  application  over  the  greater  portion 
of  the  service,  in  but  relatively  few  branches  of  the  service, 
will  currently  yield  sufficiently  valuable  results  to  warrant  the 
cost  of  its  maintenance  and  the  rigidity  which  it  of  necessity 
induces  in  the  system  of  personnel  administration. 

A  question  of  great  importance  in  devising  a  system  of  effi- 
ciency rating  is  that  of  the  provision,  if  any,  that  shall  be 

'  In  this  connection  mention  should  be  made  of  a  variation  of  the 
system  of  promotion  by  efficiency  record  which  has  been  suggested. 
This  proposal  would  require  the  appointing  officer  to  promote  the  em- 
ployee having  the  best  efficiency  record  unless  he  were  able  to  present 
to  the  head  of  the  department  or  other  superior  authority  a  satisfactory 
reason  why,  despite  his  better  record,  that  employee  should  not  be 
promoted  and  the  promotion  should  go  to  an  employee  with  an  inferior 
efficiency  record.  A  system  of  character  is  not  properly  a  system  of 
selection  by  efficiency  record.  It  is  a  combination  of  such  a  system  and 
a  system  of  free  discretion  in  superior  administrative  officers  which  is 
described  in  a  subsequent  section. 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  331 

made  for  the  right  of  employees  who  beHeve  that  their  rat- 
ings are  not  fair,  to  appeal  to  a  superior  authority.  In  seek- 
ing to  meet  this  point  the  designers  of  certain  systems  have 
provided  for  appellate  tribunals  having  the  power  to  reverse  the 
ratings  given  by  the  administrative  officer  upon  appeal  by  the 
employee.  The  character  and  implications  of  this  system  of 
appeal  should  be  clearly  understood.  It  should  not  be  con- 
fused with  the  provision  found  in  some  systems  by  which  the 
ratings  made  by  the  several  administrative  officers  are  reviewed 
and  equalized  by  a  committee  or  board  before  final  promulga- 
tion. What  is  here  referred  to  is  the  recognition  of  the  right 
on  the  part  of  the  employee  w'ho  feels  himself  aggrieved  by  the 
rating  given  him,  even  after  such  reviewing  and  equalization 
by  the  administrative  board,  to  appeal  to  a  board  which,  at  his 
complaint,  will  sit  in  judgment  upon  his  administrative  su- 
perior, and,  if  he  succeeds,  secure  an  amendment  of  the  rating 
in  his  favor. 

That  many  of  the  most  deserving  employees  hesistate  to 
resort  to  a  board  of  this  kind  in  antagonism  to  their  superior 
officers  is  the  least  of  the  objections  to  this  procedure.  Its 
radical  defect  is  that  it  sets  at  naught  the  whole  principle  of 
administrative  responsibility.  For  an  administrative  superior 
to  be  placed  upon  the  defensive  as  against  his  employee,  and 
for  the  employee  to  be  the  victor,  and  for  the  two  to  continue 
in  the  relation  of  employee  and  superior  is  a  result  to  be 
avoided  at  all  costs.  In  a  correct  personnel  system,  where  the 
employee  does  not  feel  that  he  is  receiving  justice  at  the  hands 
of  his  superior,  machinery  and  procedure  should  be  provided  by 
which  such  employee  may  be  transferred  to  another  branch  of 
the  organization.  In  due  course  it  will  appear  whether  the 
employee  is  one  who  cannot  get  along  with  his  superiors  or 
whether  the  superior  is  one  with  whom  his  employees  cannot  co- 
operate, or  W'ho  does  not  govern  his  employees  with  an  equal 
hand  in  the  matter  of  promotions,  reassignments,  and  the  like. 
But  so  long  as  a  given  employee  remains  subordinate  to  a 
given  superior  the  employee  should  not  be  permitted,  except 
for  the  very  gravest  of  reasons,  to  go  over  the  head  of  his 


332  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

superior  officer  and  obtain  an  action  which  his  superior  has 
denied. 

The  Reclassification  Commission  has  recommended  that 
authority  be  vested  in  the  Civil  Service  Commission  to  review 
ratings  and,  if  necessary,  to  withhold  its  approval.  The  Com- 
mission thus  recommended: 

That  the  Civil  Service  Commission  be  authorized  and  di- 
rected to  arrange  for  the  installation  of  efficiency  rating  sys- 
tems in  the  various  government  establishments;  that  the  ap- 
propriate administrative  officers  be  required  to  rate  all  em- 
ployees under  their  direction  in  accordance  with  these  systems 
and  under  such  rules  and  regulations  as  the  Civil  Service 
Commission  may  prescribe,  all  such  ratings  to  be  forwarded  to 
the  Civil  Service  Commission  for  review  and  final  approval, 
and  that  the  ratings  of  individual  employees  be  open  to  the 
appropriate  administrative  officers  and  to  all  other  employees 
in  the  same  class. 

It  is  very  much  to  be  questioned  whether  any  such  system 
of  central  control  is  either  desirable  or  feasible.  The  trans- 
mission to  the  Civil  Service  Commission  of  all  efficiency  rat- 
ings would  entail  an  enormous  amount  of  work.  Nor  does 
it  seem  proper  that  it  should  have  general  authority  to  with- 
hold final  approval  in  respect  to  such  ratings.  It  would  seem 
to  be  sufficient  if  the  Commission  had  authority  to  make  full 
investigation  wherever  it  has  reason  to  believe  that  an  efficiency 
rating  system  was  not  being  properly  carried  out  in  good 
faith  and  to  report  the  result  of  its  investigation  to  the  superior 
departmental  officer,  to  the  President,  and  to  Congress, 

Competitive  Examination. — The  value  of  competitive  ex- 
aminations as  a  means  of  selection  for  promotion  varies  ac- 
cording to  the  number  of  employees  who  enter  the  competition. 
In  systems  of  public  personnel  administration  where  the 
method  of  competitive  examination  is  used  as  either  the  sole 
or  a  principal  factor  in  making  selections  for  promotion, 
the  appointing  officer  is  almost  invariably  permitted  to  select 
for  promotion  one  of  the  three  employees  rated  highest  on 
the  examination.    Where  the  number  of  employees  competing 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  333 

is  large,  as  in  the  case  of  the  lower  grades,  this  freedom  of 
choice  is  of  little  significance,  as  even  the  selection  of  three 
from  among  the  large  number  is  a  substantial,  if  not  a  com- 
plete, restriction  upon  the  discretion  of  the  appointing  officer. 
As  applied  to  the  higher  promotions,  however,  the  option  of 
selection  of  any  of  the  three  rated  highest  frequently  gives 
the  appointing  officer  virtually  a  free  hand ;  for,  in  these  higher 
grades,  it  happens  frequently  that  not  more  than  three  em- 
ployees can  be  considered,  by  any  possibility,  as  eligible  for 
the  promotion  in  question.  Under  such  circumstances  a  com- 
petitive promotion  examination  is  more  or  less  of  a  formality 
except  in  so  far  as  it  debars  from  selection  one  who  is  in- 
capable of  obtaining  even  a  qualifying  rating. 

The  advantages  claimed  for  the  system  of  competitive 
examination  in  the  matter  of  determining  promotions  are 
that  it  requires  a  test  of  relative  abilities,  that  it  imposes 
a  wholesome  check  upon  the  display  of  favoritism  on  the  part 
of  recommending  or  appointing  officers,  that  it  constitutes  a 
safeguard  against  outside  political  or  other  pressure  upon  the 
appointing  officer,  and  that  it  contributes  to  the  general  morale 
of  the  service  through  the  apparent  guarantee  that  it  affords 
of  fairness  in  handling  this  important  branch  of  personnel 
administration. 

No  one  can  question  the  validity  of  these  claims.  Op- 
posed to  them  are,  however,  other  considerations  which,  under 
certain  conditions  at  least,  may  go  far  toward  offsetting  these 
advantages.  The  most  obvious  of  these  is  the  limitations 
upon  any  examination  system  in  determining  the  personal  qual- 
ities, as  distinguished  from  the  attainments  of  the  competing 
employees.  In  many  cases  the  former  may  be  of  more  im- 
portance than  the  latter.  And  these  are  qualifications  which 
can  be  determined  only  by  the  exercise  of  personal  judgment. 

It  has  been  pointed  out  already  that  the  system  of  com- 
petitive examination  finds  a  far  stronger  justification  in  the 
field  of  recruitment  than  in  selection  from  within.  Even 
the  warmest  defenders  of  the  rigidly  competitive  system,  as  ap- 
plied to  the  former  field,  do  not  maintain,  however,  that  that 


334  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

system,  always,  or  even  nearly  always,  arranges  the  com- 
petitors on  the  eligible  list  in  precisely  the  order  demanded  by 
their  relative  abilities  and  qualifications.  All  that  is  urged  is 
that,  as  a  whole,  and  over  a  considerable  period,  those  selected 
are  substantially  as  capable  and  meritorious  as  those  who 
would  be  secured  by  a  system  involving  a  greater  element 
of  personal  judgment  on  the  part  of  the  appointing  officer; 
and  that  to  the  extent  this  is  not  true,  the  sacrifice  entailed' 
is  outweighed  by  the  exclusion  of  all  possibility  of  the  en- 
trance of  political  or  other  improper  considerations.  The 
system  of  selection  for  promotion,  how^ever,  has  to  meet  a 
far  more  exacting  standard.  On  pain  of  impairing  the  morale 
of  the  working  force,  it  must  select  accurately.  In  promo- 
tion, improper  selection,  except  under  the  most  severe  pres- 
sure of  political  forces,  cannot  be  condoned  on  the  plea  that 
the  mechanical  methods  employed  for  selection  were  neces- 
sary to  insure  the  exclusion  of  political  considerations. 

The  competitive  examination  is  arbitrary.  In  the  selection 
of  subject  matter  for  questions,  and  in  framing  them,  there 
is  obviously  opportunity  for  accidentally  favoring  one  candi- 
date or  another  in  a  matter  which  has  no  specific  relation  to 
the  requirements  of  the  work,  or  the  position  to  which  the 
promotion  is  to  be  made.  Expert  and  careful  examining 
service  will  tend  to  reduce  this  accidental  element  to  a  min- 
imum, but  it  cannot  be  eliminated  entirely.  The  examination, 
moreover,  is  given  on  a  single  day  or  on  two  or  three  days; 
and  at  that  particular  time  the  several  employees  may  not  be 
relatively  in  their  normal  mental  and  physical  condition.  The 
final  element  of  accident  arises  in  fixing  numerical  ratings  rep- 
resenting the  examiner's  appraisal  of  the  questions  and  the 
value  of  the  answers  made  by  the  several  candidates.  Such 
a  process  is  inherently  artificial.  It  becomes  all  the  more  so 
v^^hen  the  examination  is  divided  into  several  subjects,  each 
assigned  an  arbitrary  weight  by  which  the  mark  of  the  competi- 
tor is  to  be  multiplied  in  order  to  obtain  his  final  average  which 
determines  his  standing  on  the  eligible  list. 

These  possibilities  are  present,  of  course,  in  any  competi- 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  335 

tive  examination;  but,  in  a  competitive  examination  for  en- 
trance to  the  service,  they  are  less  important,  since  a  candidate 
has  no  vested  right  to  entrance  and  must  take  his  chances  with 
the  process  of  selection  for  entrance  which  the  best  interests 
of  the  service  demand.  In  the  case  of  an  employee  already  in 
the  service,  however,  it  is  wholly  unjustifiable  to  require  him 
to  take  chances  with  his  chief  reward  of  service  merely  in  order 
to  satisfy  some  extraneous  requirement  of  the  personnel  sys- 
tem. 

In  summary,  it  may  be  said  that  the  method  of  competitive 
examination  may  be  used  profitably  where  large  numbers  of 
subordinate  employees  are  all  eligible  for  a  promotion  to  a 
hig^her  grade,  itself  minor.^  Even  in  such  a  case,  however, 
selection  by  competitive  examination  is,  at  best,  unreliable  and 
should  certainly  be  qualified,  to  some  extent,  by  the  considera- 
tion of  efficiency  records.  In  the  more  important  promotions, 
however,  a  written  competitive  examination,  consisting  of  set 
questions,  is  wholly  unsuitable.  To  make  an  important  promo- 
tion depend  primarily,  or  even  largely,  upon  the  more  or  less 
accidental  results  of  a  written  examination  on  a  set  paper  is  to 
introduce  into  the  administration  of  the  personnel  system  an 
element  of  hazard  and  capriciousness  unjust  alike  to  the  effi- 
cient employee  and  to  the  sincere  administrative  officer. 

This  conclusion  is  reached  in  the  face  of  respectable 
authority.  In  1910  a  special  committee  appointed  by  the 
National  Civil  Service  Reform  League  reported  in  favor  of  the 
general  application  of  promotion  examinations  in  the  federal 
service.  The  substance  of  the  committee's  report  is  contained 
in  the  following  paragraphs :  " 

We  have  now  considered  various  known  methods  of  pro- 
motion and  come  to  the  question  of  the  practical  application 
of  a  promotion  system  to  conditions  existing  in  the  federal 
service.     Of    these   methods    "free   promotion"    must   be    re- 

'  Twenty-seventh  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion (1910),  p.  27,  "In  promotion  from  one  grade  to  another  it  is  believed 
that  examinations  now  prescribed  by  the  rules  may  profitably  be  made 
competitive  where  there  is  a  sufficient  number  of  employees  to  justify  it." 

'Proceedings,  National  Civil  Service  Reform  League,  1910,  pp.  84 
and  85. 


336  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

jected,  as  it  has  been  already  shown  to  be  unsiiited  to  these 
conditions.  Seniority,  efficiency  records,  and  competitive  ex- 
amination all  have  their  value  as  elements  which  should  enter 
into  consideration  in  making  promotions.  The  question  would 
seem  to  be  how  they  can  best  be  combined? 

In  our  opinion  seniority  should  be  made  a  determining 
factor  in  promotion  only  when  the  application  of  other  tests 
of  efficiency  show  that  two  candidates  are  practically  equal. 

Efficiency  records  as  they  do  not  bear  directly  on  the  main 
question — the  ability  to  perform  the  duties  of  a  higher  position 
— should  not  be  given  a  preponderating  weight. 

Competitive  examination,  as  going  most  directly  to  the  root 
of  the  matter  and  providing  an  impartial  test  of  ability  to  per- 
form the  duties  of  a  higher  position,  should  be  given  at  least 
a  weight  of  50  per  cent. 

Despite  the  distinguished  personnel  of  this  committee  ^  it 
is  believed  that  few  who  have  had  practical  experience  with  the 
use  of  competitive  examinations  as  the  means  of  selecting  for 
promotion  will  find  themselves  in  accord  with  the  committee. 
That  competitive  examination  would  constitute,  of  course,  a 
well  nigh  ideal  method  of  selection  for  promotion  if  it  actually 
succeeded  in  selecting  the  person  best  qualified  for,  or  most 
deserving  of,  the  promotion,  is  self-evident.  The  essential 
question,  which  the  committee  (?ompletely  escaped  by  assuming 
an  affirmative  answer,  is  whether  it  is  at  all  practicable  to  de- 
vise for  any  of  the  more  difficult  promotions,  particularly  those 
involving  even  minor  administrative  responsibilities,  a  type  of 
competitive  examination  which  will  actually  be  eflFective. 

The  Reclassification  Commission  has  likewise  gone  on 
record  as  favoring  the  employment  of  competitive  examination 
in  selection  for  promotion.  After  discussing  measures  looking 
to  the  enlargement  of  the  opportunity  for  advancement  in 
the  federal  service,  the  Commission  says :  -  "Since  the  only 
fair  method  of  determining  who  are  best  qualified  is  by  ex- 
amination, appointment  to  the  higher  classes  should  be  made 
only  as  the  result  of  competitive  examination,  open  to  all  those 

*  Charles    W.    Eliot,    Chairman.    Joseph    P.    Cotton,    Jr.,    Richard    H. 
Dana,  William  Dudley  Foulke,  and  Elliott  H.  Goodwin. 
'Report,  Part  I,  p.  124. 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  337 

of  the  service  who  are  quaHfied  under  the  class  specifications." 
Apparently  fearful,  however,  that  exception  would  be  taken 
to  the  use  of  competitive  examinations  because  of  the  wide- 
spread belief  in  their  impracticability,  the  Commission  goes 
on  to  say:  "Such  examinations  need  not,  of  course,  be 
academic  in  character,  but  may  be  based  on  actual  accomplish- 
ment and  demonstrated  ability  for  the  work  of  the  higher 
class."  Just  what  the  Commission  means  by  this  is  not  clear. 
"Actual  accomplishment"  cannot  be  tested  by  examination. 
Any  opinion  on  this  head  must  be  based  upon  records  of  past 
performance;  and  to  the  extent  that  these  are  employed  the 
method  of  selection  is  not  that  of  competitive  examination  but 
of  the  efficiency  record.  Again,  "demonstrated  ability  for 
the  work  of  the  higher  class,"  that  is,  for  the  position  to 
w^hich  the  promotion  is  to  be  made,  cannot  be  tested  in  the 
great  majority  of  cases  except  by  actual  trial  of  the  employee, 
w^hich  is,  of  course,  inconsistent  with  the  proposal  of  a  com- 
petitive examination,  besides  being  wholly  impracticable  un- 
der ordinary  conditions. 

Some  years  ago  when  promotion  regulations  were  first 
applied  to  the  Custom  House  service  in  New  York  City, 
competitive  examination  was  employed  in  determining  promo- 
tion from  one  clerical  grade  to  another.  In  1909,  however, 
the  use  of  the  competitive  examination  for  this  purpose  was 
abandoned,  and  a  system  of  efficiency  records  instituted.  Un- 
fortunately there  is  no  official  statement  available  as  to  why 
this  step  was  taken.  The  report  of  the  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion merely  states  that  it  was  taken  "better  to  meet  existing 
conditions."  ^ 

Combination  of  Efficiency  Records,  Competitive  Examina- 
tion, and  Seniority. — It  remains  to  consider  to  what  extent  the 
combination  of  any  or  all  of  the  three  methods  of  restriction 
upon  the  discretion  of  administrative  officers,  just  reviewed, 
may  offer  advantages  not  found  in  the  use  of  any  one  of  these 
methods  singly. 

*  Twenty-sixth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion (1909),  p.  29. 


338  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Since  the  opinion  has  been  expressed  that  both  the  meth- 
ods of  efficiency  record  and  of  competitive  examination  are  un- 
reHable  in  their  operation  except  within  restricted  areas  of 
the  service,  it  is  not  beheved  that  any  greater  reHabiHty  can 
be  secured  by  combining  them  in  an  arbitrary  manner.  In 
those  parts  of  the  service,  however,  in  which  either  would 
properly  be  applicable  singly,  their  combination,  with  the 
proper  assignment  of  weight  to  each,  is  desirable.  On  the  one 
hand,  the  examination  tests  the  capacity  of  the  employee  for 
performing  the  duties  of  the  higher  position,  in  a  way  that  is 
not  done  by  efficiency  records;  while,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
record  serves  to  prevent  a  brilliant,  but  not  altogether  steady- 
going,  employee  from  obtaining  promotion  merely  through  a 
good  examination. 

In  view  of  the  fact  that  the  seniority  factor  furnishes  so 
slight  a  test  of  merit,  little  use  should  be  made  of  it,  except  as 
between  two  employees  whose  records  or  examinations,  or  both, 
are  substantially  equal. 

General  Summary  of  Formal  Promotion  Methods. — In  the 
foregoing  review  of  formal  promotion  methods  the  conclusion 
has  been  reached  that  the  efifective  use  of  these  methods, 
either  singly  or  in  combination,  is  limited  to  restricted  areas 
of  service,  and  more  particularly  to  the  lower  grades ;  and 
that,  except  as  to  these  areas,  their  limitations  are  such  as 
to  make  their  employment  unwarranted  as  controlling  factors 
both  from  the  standpoint  of  administrative  efficiency  and  that 
of  doing  justice  to  the  capable  employee.  To  state  this  in  an- 
other way,  the  general  conclusion  is  that,  valuable  as  mechanical 
or  formal  methods  of  selection  may  be  as  aids  to  the  personal 
judgment  of  those  responsible  for  taking  action,  they  should 
not  be  erected  into  substitutes  for  the  exercise  of  such  judg- 
ment. 

Substantially  this  conclusion  has  been  reached  by  one  of 
the  ablest  administrators  who  has  occupied  a  Cabinet  position 
in  recent  years.  In  his  report  for  iqio,  the  Secretary  of  Com- 
merce and  Labor,  Charles  Nagel,  had  this  to  say  on  the  sub- 
ject of  promotion: 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  339 

Promotion  of  employees  in  the  Government  service  con- 
stitutes one  of  the  most  difficnh  questicjns  presented  in  the 
actual  everyday  administration  of  departmental  affairs,  al- 
though practically  there  is  but  little  restriction  by  the  civil 
service  rules  on  this  subject.  Promotion  without  examination 
to  a  grade  for  which  the  entrance  tests  are  higher  or  essentially 
different  is  prohibited,  but  for  the  great  bulk  of  promotions 
which  are  usually  within  a  grade,  the  promoting  officer  is  free 
to  exercise  his  discretion.  That  difficulties  attend  the  promul- 
gation of  practical  regulations  to  govern  promotions  is  shown 
by  the  several  ineffectual  attempts  to  enforce  rules  which  have 
been  adopted,  and  by  the  significant  fact  that  the  Civil  Serv- 
ice Commission,  which  seems  to  be  particularly  charged  under 
the  civil  service  law  with  the  duty  of  formulating  promotion 
regulations,  has  not  been  able  after  years  of  study  to  present 
anything  workable  and  effective.  The  ideal  system  is  one  in 
which  political,  personal,  and  social  influences  are  entirely 
eliminated,  thereby  insuring  promotion  solely  on  merit;  and 
the  purpose  of  any  system  should  be  to  guide  in  determining 
who  of  a  number  of  employees  excels  in  special  qualifications 
or  general  efficiency.  A  scholastic  examination  does  not  ap- 
pear to  be  a  means  to  this  desirable  end.  It  is  well  enough' 
to  provide  a  scholastic  test  for  entrance  to  the  service,  but  the 
conditions  within  the  service  call  for  an  entirely  different 
test  for  promotion.  Employees  work  under  the  direction  and 
observation  of  chiefs  of  bureaus  and  divisions;  their  capacity, 
efficiency,  and  resourcefulness  are  observed  and  judged  by 
them ;  and  in  the  final  analysis  their  rights  to  advancement 
should  be  wholly  determined  by  the  opinions  of  these  super- 
vising officials,  provided,  always,  that  such  opinions  are  judi- 
cious, well  informed,  and  conscientiously  reached. 

During  the  spring  and  summer  of  1909,  when  this  depart- 
ment instituted  a  thorough  inquiry  into  the  efficiency  of  its 
personnel,  it  was  demonstrated  that  as  an  aid  to  arriving  at  a 
just  estimate  of  the  merits  of  employees  for  promotion,  chiefs 
of  bureaus  should  be  required  to  report  from  time  to  time  on 
the  efficiency  of  all  under  their  charge.  These  reports  should 
bear  upon  the  quantity  and  quality  of  work  done  by  employees 
as  well  as  the  interest  manifested  in  it,  and,  upon  the  theory 
that  the  government  is  entitled  to  a  day's  work  for  a  day's  pay, 
should  show  whether  the  employees  are  actually  earning  their 
salaries.  After  this  information  has  been  procured,  recom- 
mendations for  promotion  from  bureau  chiefs  should  be  con- 


340  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

sidered  in  connection  with  the  efticiency  ratings  previously  sub- 
mitted, and  if  it  should  appear  that  employees  not  having  the 
highest  ratings  are  recommended  for  advancement  the  bureau 
officers  should  be  called  upon  for  an  explanation.  Under  such 
a  system  there  is  no  reason  vs^hy  promotions  should  not  be 
justly  made.  It  is  barely  possible  that  there  may  be  an  occa- 
sional instance  in  which  an  employee  may  be  recommended  by 
a  chief  of  bureau  on  account  of  some  personal  or  political  in- 
fluence, but  in  practically  all  cases  the  report  and  recommenda- 
tion of  the  chief  are  based  upon  merit  and  are  just  as  little 
open  to  criticism  as  they  would  be  under  a  more  elaborate  sys- 
tem. It  is  not  believed  that  any  sort  of  mechanical  and  self- 
operative  method  of  promotion  could  be  devised,  or  any  set 
rules  established,  which  could  possibly  take  the  place  of  the 
discretion,  fairness,  and  knowledge  of  the  chief  of  a  bureau.^ 

The  position  of  the  Reclassification  Commission  on  this 
matter  has  been  commented  on  already.  That  body  reported 
rather  unequivocally  in  favor  of  the  use  of  promotion  exami- 
nation. As  already  indicated,  however,  the  vagueness  of  its 
recommendations  on  this  head  is  such  as  to  greatly  impair 
its  weight  and  value. 

The  present  views  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  on 
this  subject  are  not  available  in  public  form.  The  latest 
published  expression  of  opinion  by  the  Commission  is  found 
in  its  Twenty-seventh  Report,  dated  191 1.  In  that  report 
is  found  the  following  on  the  question  of  formal  promotion 
methods : 

The  application  of  practical  regulations  to  govern  promo- 
tions has  been  found  difficult,  and  little  progress  has  been 
made  in  that  regard.  Under  the  civil  service  rules  non-com- 
petitive examinations  are  held  to  test  fitness  of  employees 
recommended  for  promotion  to  positions  for  which  the  en- 
trance tests  are  different  from  those  of  the  positions  which 
they  hold,  and  in  certain  services  promotion  regulations  pro- 
viding for  competitive  examinations  from  grade  to  grade  are 
in  force.  Several  of  the  departments  also  have  adopted  sys- 
tems of  limited  a,j)plication  for  the  keeping  of  efficiency  records 

'  Twenty-seventh  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Cqin- 
mission   (1910),  p.  138. 


REASSIGNMENT  AND  PROMOTION  341 

of  employees  and  for  promotion  in  accordance  therewith.  In 
some  cases  these  systems  have  been  discontinued  owing  to  lack 
of  satisfactory  results.  In  others,  where  conditions  are  more 
favorable,  they  are  still  in  force.  .  .  . 

There  are  at  least  four  bases  or  methods  of  making  pro- 
motions. First,  that  of  free  selection  by  the  promoting  of- 
ficer. This  is  said  to  work  well  in  private  business,  where 
the  motive  of  profit  enters ;  in  the  public  service  it  has  been 
tried,  and  in  recent  years  has  given  better  results  than  for- 
merly from  the  standpoint  of  administrative  efficiency.  An- 
other method  is  that  of  promotion  by  seniority,  which  has 
slight  relation  to  efficiency  and  which  should  be  used  only  as 
a  means  of  discriminating  among  candidates  whose  other  quali- 
fications are  equal.  A  third  method  is  that  of  competitive  ex- 
amination. It  has  been  advanced  that  under  this  method  the 
employees  are  placed  on  an  equal  footing,  as  the  personal  equa- 
tion is  eliminated  and  impartial  tests  are  applied.  This  method 
has  been  tried  in  the  past  to  some  extent  and  afterwards  aban- 
doned for  promotions  from  class  to  class  within  a  grade,  ap- 
parently because  of  the  belief  that  for  such  promotions  the 
value  of  employees  could  be  more  accurately  and  fairly  meas- 
ured from  daily  observation  of  their  actual  work.  In  promo- 
tion from  one  grade  to  another  it  is  believed  that  examinations 
now  prescribed  by  the  rules  may  profitably  be  made  competi- 
tive where  ther^  is  a  sufficient  number  of  employees  to  jus- 
tify it.  A  fourth  method,  that  of  promotion  on  records  of 
efficiency,  has  too  rarely  been  found  to  work  satisfactorily, 
as  the  ratings  are  likely  to  become  perfunctory  and  to  lack 
relativity  and  uniformity  unless  the  system  is  applied  by  a 
supervisory  body. 

While  each  method  has  its  supporters,  a  system  combin- 
ing seniority,  efficiency  ratings,  and  competitive  examinations 
has  also  its  advocates. 

The  commission  favors  the  making  of  promotions  com- 
petitively on  the  basis  of  efficiency,  ascertained  by  a  uniform 
and  impartial  mode  of  procedure  applicable  to  all  departments. 

A  uniform  system  of  estimating  and  recording  the  relative 
efficiency  of  employees  could  then  be  adopted  and  more  ef- 
fectively applied  for  all  bureaus  and  offices  in  all  departments. 
This  can  best  be  accomplished  by  the  aid  of  an  independent 
commission  or  body,  such  as  the  Civil  Service  Commission. 
To  secure  uniform  methods  of  procedure  and  results  in  all 
bureaus  and  departments,  it  would  be  well  for  the  commission 


342  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

to  prescribe  the  necessary  forms  for  recording  efficiency  ratings 
and  to  have  some  part  in  coordinating  and  harmonizing  the 
ratings,  such  as  representation  on  a  board  of  review  and  ap- 
peals. A  true  record  of  relative  efficiency,  fairly  estimated, 
and  available  to  the  heads  of  departments  and  the  Civil  Service 
Commission,  would  undoubtedly  greatly  aid  in  maintaining 
efficiency  and  economy  in  the  service.-^ 

The  fact  that  the  conclusions  reached  regarding  the  ap- 
plicability of  the  several  formal  methods  of  selecting  employees 
for  promotion  are  more  or  less  of  a  negative  character  make 
it  desirable  to  discover,  if  possible,  some  other  means  by  which, 
while  leaving  to  the  apix)inting  officers  due  discretion,  safe- 
guards against  an  improper  use  of  this  power  may  be  set  up. 

It  is  believed  that  the  key  to  the  problem  lies,  not  in  sub- 
stituting mechanical  methods  for  free  discretion,  but  rather 
in  so  guarding  the  exercise  of  free  discretion  that  it  may  be 
employed  without  fear  of  the  injection  of  political  or  personal 
favoritism.  This  can  be  accomplished  by  the  development  of 
machinery  and  organized  procedure  for  exercising  discretion 
in  promotion  as  against  entrusting  that  discretion  wholly  to  a 
single  administrative  officer.  In  each  service,  bureau,  or  other 
organization  unit,  there  should  be  developed  a  committee 
of  administrative  officers  charged  with  responsibility  for  mak- 
ing recommendations  in  respect  to  all  selections  for  promotion. 
Provision  should  be  made  for  developing  and  furnishing  to 
this  committee  or  body  complete  information  regarding  the 
character  of  work  performed  by  and  the  qualifications  for 
promotion  of  all  employees.  The  basic  element  in  the  pro- 
vision of  this  information  should  be,  of  course,  a  system  of 
efficiency  or  service  records  currently  maintained.  This  record 
should  be  a  current  record  of  all  facts  bearing  on  the  em- 
ployee's service.  It  should  be  made  periodically;  but  entries 
may  also  be  made  from  time  to  time  as  special  occasion  there- 
for arises.  It  should  contain  expressions  of  opinion  as  well 
as  statements  of  fact.     These  may  be  expressed  in  any  terms 

*  Twenty-seventh   Report  of   the   United   States   Civil    Service   Com* 
niissjon  (1910),  pp.  26,  27,  and  28. 


REASSIGNMENT  A^D  PROMOTION  343 

which  may  seem  best  to  the  administrative  officer  whose  own 
convenience  will  dictate,  of  course,  the  desirability  of  express- 
ing all  records  so  far  as  possible  in  standard  terms.  These 
periodic  records  should  be  supplemented  by  a  full  statement, 
submitted  by  the  proper  administrative  officer  at  the  time 
of  the  proposed  promotion,  explaining  with  particularity  any 
reason  for  a  variation  from  what  would  normally  be  expected 
from  the  face  of  the  efficiency  records  previously  entered.  It 
should  also  be  within  the  power  of  this  committee  or  board 
to  summon  before  it  for  interview,  or  even  for  written  test,  if 
it  thinks  such  test  appropriate,  all  the  candidates  or  such  of 
them  as  it  may  deem  desirable.  With  all  these  various  sources 
of  information  at  its  disposal,  it  is  believed  that  a  committee 
animated  by  a  desire  to  act  fairly  could  effect,  in  virtually  every 
case,  a  recommendation  consonant  with  the  best  interests  of 
the  service  from  the  standpoint  both  of  administrative  effi- 
ciency and  of  the  morale  of  the  service;  and  that  its  judgment, 
in  almost  every  case,  would  coincide  with  that  of  the  adminis- 
trative officer  immediately  concerned. 

A  question  of  no  little  importance  in  providing  for  such 
promotional  boards  is  whether  or  not  representation  on  such 
boards  should  be  given  to  the  central  personnel  agency,  the 
Civil  Service  Commission.  If  the  policy  advocated  in  this 
volume  of  increasing  greatly  the  responsibility  of  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  for  seeing  that  proper  personnel  methods 
are  employed  by  the  several  departments  and  services  is 
adopted,  it  is  believed  that  substantial  benefit  would  result 
from  at  least  giving  to  the  Commission  the  right,  if  it  so  de- 
sired, of  having  a  representative  participate  in  the  board  pro- 
ceedings. 

Experience  elsewhere,  and  particularly  in  the  city  of  New 
York,  in  connection  with  the  efficiency  record  installation  at- 
tempted there  in  the  years  1916-1917,  has  demonstrated  that 
results  of  the  highest  character  may  be  secured  by  the  direct 
participation  of  a  representative  of  the  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion in  departmental  personnel  boards,  provided,  of  course, 
such  representative  is  of  a  sufficiently  high  caliber.     The  mere 


344  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

presence  of  such  a  representative  on  such  a  board  insures  at 
once  that  the  proceedings  will  be  more  formal  and  business- 
like in  character  than  they  frequently  are  when  confined  to 
officers  of  the  department  or  bureau  known  to  one  another. 
It  insures,  furthermore,  that  no  action  will  be  taken  unless 
full  explanation  of  the  reason  for  such  action  is  presented  to 
the  board.  It  places  obvious  difficulties  in  the  way  of  any 
attempt  to  award  a  promotion  to  a  political  or  personal  favor- 
ite. When  it  is  appreciated  by  the  board  that  it  is  supposed 
to  be  guided  in  its  determinations  largely,  if  not  almost  ex- 
clusively, by  the  records  before  it,  including,  as  already  sug- 
gested, the  statements  of  the  eligible  employees  themselves,  all 
of  which  are  open  for  the  examination  of  the  representative  of 
the  Civil  Service  Commission  as  fully  as  to  the  members  of 
the  board,  and  when  it  is  further  appreciated  that  this  repre- 
sentative has  the  power  to  lay  before  the  Commission  the  facts 
in  any  case  where  the  action  of  the  board  seems  to  him  arbi- 
trary and  governed  by  considerations  other  than  those  which 
appear  on  the  record,  his  presence  becomes  a  force  far  more 
potent  for  the  observance  of  merit  principles  in  promotion  than 
can  any  mechanical  method  whatsoever. 


CHAPTER  X 
RECRUITMENT  METHODS;   SOME  BASIC  ASPECTS 

Of  the  several  distinct  systems  of  recruitment  now  in 
force,  springing  from  the  varying  provisions  of  the  law  and 
rules  which  were  reviewed  in  an  earlier  chapter,  that  estab- 
lished under  the  civil  service  law  is,  of  course,  far  the  most 
important;  and  the  next  chapter  is  devoted  wholly  to  its 
detailed  discussion.  The  succeeding  chapter  takes  up  simi- 
larly the  other  existing  formal  systems  of  recruitment — 
those  for  recruiting  laborers,  presidential  postmasters,  mem- 
bers of  the  foreign  service,  and  the  medical  corps  of  the  Pub- 
lic Health  Service.  Certain  aspects  of  the  recruitment  prob- 
lem are,  however,  of  so  basic  a  character  that  it  seems  de- 
sirable to  consider  them  in  relation  to  all  these  several  re- 
cruitment systems  at  the  outset.  To  these  basic  aspects  the 
present  chapter  is  devoted. 

Emphasis  upon  Education. — A  question  directly  related 
to  the  problem  of  selection  is  that  of  the  emphasis  which 
should  be  placed  upon  the  possession  by  the  entrant  to  the  serv- 
ice of  educational  attainments,  whether  general  or  technical, 
superior  to  those  strictly  required  for  the  performance  of  the 
duties  to  which  he  is  to  be  appointed.  H  the  purpose  is  pri- 
marily to  secure  a  recruit  who  will  be  able  within  a  reasonable 
time  to  master  the  specialized  duties  to  which  he  is  to  be  as- 
signed immediately  upon  entrance,  little  attention  need  be  paid 
to  any  education  which  is  not  directly  and  definitely  applicable 
to  those  duties.  H,  on  the  other  hand,  the  recruit  is  regarded, 
not  merely  as  an  agency  for  performing  a  particular  immedi- 
ate task,  but  also  as  potential  material  for  advancement  to 
higher  levels  of  the  service,  the  education  of  the  recruit,  in  so 

345 


346  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

far  as  superior  education  is  regarded  as  increasing  his  poten- 
tial value,  must  be  given  proper  consideration. 

In  a  preceding  chapter  it  was  urged  that  much  could  be 
done  in  the  federal  service,  and  in  personnel  systems  gen- 
erally, by  encouraging  and  facilitating  the  acquisition  of  fur- 
ther education  by  those  already  in  the  service.  To  the  extent 
that  this  may  successfully  be  done  the' emphasis  upon  educa- 
tion in  recruitment,  of  course,  may  be  lessened.  But  there 
will  always  be  fields  in  which  it  will  be  unsafe  to  rely  solely, 
or  even  chiefly,  upon  the  further  education  of  the  personnel 
already  in  the  service.  In  these  fields  it  will  always  be  neces- 
sary to  give  attention  to  the  possession  of  educational  attain- 
ments by  a  proportion  at  least  of  those  recruited.  As  has 
been  indicated  already,  this  is  essentially  the  theory  under- 
lying the  British  system  of  selections  for  those  clerical  posi- 
tions which  lead  into  administrative  work.  The  vice  of  the 
British  system  consists  in  its  awarding  to  those  who  enter  at 
the  higher  level,  under  this  theory,  a  virtual  monopoly  of  all 
desirable  promotion.  With  this  discriminatory  feature  elimi- 
nated and  advancement  to  the  higher  posts  opened  alike  to  all 
in  the  service  possessing  the  requisite  qualifications  regardless 
of  the  level  at  which  they  entered,  there  is  nothing  in  the  sys- 
tem which  is  not  wholly  consistent  with  the  democratic  tradi- 
tion of  American  personnel  practice. 

At  most  points  in  the  federal  service  up  to  the  present  time 
little  emphasis  has  been  laid  upon  the  educational  attainments 
of  those  in  the  lower  grades  as  evidencing  potential  capacity 
for  advancement ;  and  there  is  indeed  perhaps  no  instance  in 
the  service  in  which  entrance  at  an  advanced  level  is  permitted 
to  those  possessing  superiority  merely  in  educational  attain- 
ments. On  the  other  hand,  as  already  indicated,  no  general 
provision  has  been  made  by  the  service  for  the  educational 
advancement  of  those  already  in  the  service.  So  far  as  current 
recruitment  methods  represent  at  all  the  outworking  of  a 
theory  rather  than  the  merely  accidental  development  of  ad- 
ministrative tradition,  they  may  be  said  to  afford  no  recogni- 
tion whatever  of  the  value  of  general  education  as  increas- 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  BASIC  ASPECTS     347 

ing  the  potential  value'of  the  employee  for  advanced  responsi- 
bility. 

A  possible  exception  to  this  statement  is  perhaps  to  be 
made  in  the  case  of  the  foreign  service.  Here  in  the  clerical 
levels  the  attempt  is  made  at  certain  points  to  obtain  a  type  of 
recruit  possessing  educational  attainments  considerably  su- 
perior to  what  is  required  for  the  routine  clerical  work  of  the 
consular  and  diplomatic  establishments,  with  the  purpose  of 
developing  from  the  recruits  so  obtained  material  for  advance- 
ment to  the  positions  of  consul  and  diplomatic  secretary  and 
thence  by  promotion  through  the  several  grades  to  the  posts  of 
consul  general  and  perhaps  even  of  chief  of  mission. 

It  need  hardly  be  said  that  whatever  value  may  be  at- 
tributed to  general  education  on  the  score  of  its  broadening 
influence  must  be  awarded  in  similar  measure  to  a  varied  busi- 
ness or  professional  experience,  provided,  of  course,  that  the 
variety  does  not  spring  from  consistent  failure  in  a  succession 
of  attempted  fields.  The  difficulty,  however,  of  reducing  the 
value  of  experience  of  this  type  to  any  standard  measure  makes 
it  impracticable  to  give  it  much  consideration  in  framing  re- 
cruitment policies. 

Requirement  of  Specialized  Knowledge  and  Experience. 
— Closely  related  to  the  question  of  the  educational  attainments 
to  be  required  of  the  candidate  for  admission  to  the  service  is 
the  question  of  the  extent  to  which,  in  recruitment,  the  at- 
tempt should  be  made  to  secure  for  the  lowest  grades  persons 
already  equipped  to  do  the  work  to  which  they  will  be  assigned 
rather  than  to  train  persons  wholly  without  previous  experi- 
ence in  that  work.  In  considering  this  question  clear  distinc- 
tion must  be  drawn  between  those  classes  of  work  which  are 
found  in  private  employment  as  well  as  in  the  federal  service, 
and  those  which  are  peculiar  to  the  government  service. 

In  the  first  class  of  employments — those  found  also  in 
private  employment — there  are  again  two  fairly  distinct  types 
of  cases.  In  the  one  there  are  available,  usually  in  abundance, 
both  public  and  private  educational  institutions  giving  the 
preliminary  instruction  usually  thought  necessary  prior  to  the 


348  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

taking  up  of  gainful  employment  in  that  occupation.  In  these 
cases  the  government  is  not  itself  required  to  attempt  to  offer 
instruction.  In  general  the  government  would  probably  lind 
it  less  economical  to  do  so  than  to  leave  such  training  to  es- 
tablished channels.  Perhaps  the  only  exception  to  this  state- 
ment is  to  be  found  in  those  cases  in  which  it  is  desired  to  en- 
courage persons  already  in  the  service  to  equip  themselves  fur- 
ther educationally  and  where  the  working  hours  of  the  em- 
ployees do  not  permit  them  to  take  advantage  of  existing  edu- 
cational facilities.  In  the  larger  centers,  however,  it  will  be 
found  almost  invariably  that  where  any  appreciable  demand 
exists,  the  facilities,  whether  public  or  private,  will  be  made 
available  at  suitable  hours  by  those  engaged  in  furnishing 
them. 

In  some  employments,  however,  found  alike  in  the  business 
world  and  in  the  government  service,  it  is  not  customary  for 
the  novice  to  pursue  any  formal  course  of  instruction  prior 
to  taking  up  work,  but  to  enter  directly  upon  an  apprentice- 
ship. Whether  in  these  employments  the  government  shall 
recognize  any  responsibility  for  training  apprentices  or  shall 
rely  wholly  upon  the  supply  of  persons  who  have  occupied 
their  apprenticeship  in  private  establishments,  is  a  question  in- 
volving no  considerations  of  principle.  It  is  a  matter  to  be 
decided  with  respect  to  each  class  of  work  solely  on  the  basis 
of  current  expediency  as  determined  by  the  relative  supply  of 
available  material  which  can  be  drawn  from  any  industry  or 
commerce.  The  present  practice  of  the  service  in  this  matter 
corresponds  closely  with  this  view. 

With  respect  to  those  employments  which  are  peculiar  to 
the  government  service,  the  situation  is  quite  different  and  pre- 
sents a  problem  which  is  of  no  little  importance  as  affecting 
the  caliber  of  material  recruited.  As  an  example  of  such 
employment  may  be  cited  that  of  Inspector  of  Immigration. 
The  duties  of  the  Inspector  of  Immigration  are  to  obtain  from 
the  immigrant  a  record  of  his  history  and  the  facts  required 
in  the  application  of  the  laws  governing  the  exclusion  of  im- 
migrants and  to  determine  whether  these  facts  present  a  case 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  BASIC  ASPECTS     349 

for  exclusion.  The  performance  of  these  duties  obviously 
requires,  in  addition  to  the  general  qualifications  of  intelli- 
gence, alertness,  sympathy,  and  the  like,  a  detailed  knowledge 
of  the  immigration  laws.  Such  a  detailed  knowledge  can  be 
acquired,  of  course,  by  any  one  of  requisite  intelligence  by  a 
sufficiently  prolonged  and  concentrated  study  of  the  laws  and 
the  published  and  administrative  and  judicial  decisions  there- 
under. There  is  nothing  inherently  unreasonable,  therefore, 
in  the  requirement  that  the  persons  applying  for  the  position 
of  immigrant  inspector  shall  make  themselves  thoroughly  fa- 
miliar with  the  pertinent  laws  and  decisions. 

From  the  standpoint  of  securing  the  widest  possible  choice 
of  available  material  for  this  position,  however,  the  setting 
of  this  requirement  is  clearly  ill-advised.  From  among  all 
those  who  may  be  qualified  by  education,  personality,  and 
natural  bent  for  this  type  of  position,  this  requirement  auto- 
matically confines  selection  to  those  who,  for  whatever  reason, 
have  been  so  situated  as  to  have  been  able  to  make  the  required 
study  of  the  laws  and  decisions,  and  among  these  again  it 
gives  a  heavy  advantage  to  persons  who  have  been  able  to 
pursue  this  study  most  diligently  and  thoroughly.  Obviously 
it  may  happen  that  among  those  who,  for  whatever  reason, 
have  had  insufficient  opportunity  to  study  the  laws  and  de- 
cisions, or  having  had  the  opportunity,  have  been  unwilling 
to  do  so  on  the  mere  chance  of  a  possible  appointment  to  the 
position  at  some  uncertain  time  in  the  future,  there  may  be 
persons  who  would  be  in  every  essential  respect  better  ma- 
terial for  the  position  in  question  than  those  who  have  pur- 
sued the  requisite  study. 

The  correct  policy  in  such  a  case  as  this  would  seem  un- 
questionably to  neglect  virtually  altogether  the  specific  tech- 
nical information  required  of  the  incumbent  after  appoint- 
ment and  to  confine  the  examination  or  whatever  other  basis 
of  selection  may  be  employed  to  general  qualifications,  relying 
with  confidence  on  the  capacity  of  the  recruit  when  appointed 
to  acquire  in  a  minimum  time,  and  with  a  far  more  practical 
interest  and  bent,  the  technical  and  internal  details. 


350  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

In  the  absence  of  any  clear-cut  policy,  it  is,  of  course,  dif- 
ficult to  state  in  general  terms  the  extent  to  which  one  or  the 
other  method  is  actually  employed  at  the  present  time  in  the 
competitive  classified  service.  If  a  general  statement  must  be 
made,  however,  it  seems  safe  to  say  that  the  present  practice 
of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  too  often  requires  of  appli- 
cants specialized  and  detailed  knowledge  of  matters  familiar- 
ity with  which  can  be  acquired  only  with  great  difficulty  if  at 
all  outside  the  service  itself. 

In  the  examinations  which  are  required  for  admission  to 
the  diplomatic  and  consular  services  a  candidate  is  expected  to 
demonstrate  familiarity  with  international,  maritime,  and  com- 
mercial law;  political  and  commercial  geography;  modern  lan- 
guages ;  natural,  industrial,  and  commercial  resources  of  the 
United  States;  American  history  and  government;  and  the 
modern  history  of  foreign  countries. 

In  examinations  for  presidential  postmasterships,  it  is  in- 
teresting to  note,  the  Civil  Service  Commisison  has  required 
no  familiarity  with  methods  of  postal  business.  In  a  sense 
any  such  requirement  would  have  been  at  odds  with  the  whole 
theory  of  the  examination,  which  calls  for  open  competition 
instead  of  promotion  from  within  the  postal  service.  Never- 
theless, it  would  be  no  less  logical  to  require  familiarity  with 
postal  methods  in  this  examination  than  to  require  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  details  of  federal  law  and  practice  in  a  number  of 
open  competitive  examinations  for  the  competitive  classified 
service. 

One  result  of  the  requirement  on  the  part  of  applicants 
for  entrance  of  specialized  knowledge  which  cannot  be  obtained 
through  ordinary  courses  of  instruction  or  other  exj^erience 
in  private  employment  is  the  development  of  the  so-called 
"cramming"  schools  which,  upon  the  announcement  of  an  ex- 
amination by  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  or  upon  the  proba- 
bility that  such  an  examination  is  to  be  announced  (which 
probability,  it  need  hardly  be  said,  is  usually  advertised  and 
exaggerated  by  these  schools  upon  the  slightest  provocation) 
offer  courses  of  instruction  directly  preparatory  for  the  ex- 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  BASIC  ASPECTS     351 

amination.  Some  of  these  schools  use  the  correspondence 
method,  but  ordinary  schools  holding  regular  classes  are  to 
be  found  in  the  large  cities.  It  might  be  thought  that  these 
schools  serve  a  valuable  purpose  in  providing  the  pros- 
pective candidate  with  the  knowledge  which  he  will  be  re- 
quired to  demonstrate  on  the  examination  and  which,  if  ap- 
pointed, he  will  use  in  the  performance  of  his  duties.  Any 
one  who  is  familiar,  however,  with  the  character  of  the  in- 
struction given  at  these  schools  and  the  caliber  of  their  student 
body  will  question  this.  The  attempt  to  forecast  from  a  study 
of  previous  examinations  and  a  knowledge  of  the  workings 
of  the  official  mind  the  questions  which  are  likely  to  be  asked 
on  the  examination  is  an  activity  which,  however  valuable 
to  the  intending  competitor,  is  worthless  from  the  standpoint 
of  the  service. 

Training  for  Entrance. — A  phase  of  this  question  which 
has  been  more  or  less  discussed  in  recent  years,  is  that  of  the 
need  of  training  for  the  public  service.  This  discussion  runs 
back  about  a  decade.  It  was  particularly  animated  during 
the  years  191 3  and  1914.  In  the  former  year  a  committee 
of  the  American  Political  Science  Association  was  appointed 
to  investigate  the  possibilities  of  supplying  in  the  universities 
training  which  might  better  fit  those  for  the  public  service. 
The  committee  reported  in  favor  of  the  establishment  of 
certain  courses  for  this  purpose,^  to  be  supplemented  by  field 
work.  In  1914  a  conference  was  held  under  the  auspices 
of  the  Committee  on  "Universities  and  the  Public  Service." 
Following  upon  this  discussional  phase  of  the  matter,  courses 
in  public  administration  were  established  in  several  universi- 
ties, and  Columbia  University  entered  into  an  alliance  with  the 
training  school  for  public  service  which  had  been  established 
in  connection  with  the  New  York  Bureau  of  Municipal  Re- 
search. 

Examination  of  the  published  discussions  of  this  theme 
will  disclose  that  they  are  almost  without  exception  character- 

*  Report  of  the  Committee  on  Training  for  the  Public  Service  of  the 
American    Political    Science   Association,    Madison,    Wisconsin,    1913. 


352  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

ized  by  a  vagueness  as  to  the  specific  types  of  positions  for 
which  training  would  be  of  value.  Presumably  this  is  to  be 
explained  by  the  fact  that  a  fairly  diligent  study  has  failed 
to  reveal  clearly  the  existence  of  such  positions  on  any  signifi- 
cant scale.  The  real  difficulty  seems  to  be  that  underlying 
most  of  this  discussion  is  to  be  found  the  fallacious  assump- 
tion that  the  public  service  is  in  some  way  a  distinct  profession 
or  vocation,  when  the  fact  of  the  matter  obviously  is  that  it 
is  merely  a  distinct  area  of  employment  in  which  are  found 
many  of  the  trades,  professions,  and  callings  of  the  business 
or  professional  world,  and  but  few  which  are  not  there  to  be 
found — perhaps  none  of  which  the  close  analogy  is  not 
there  to  be  found.  And  with  respect  to  not  a  few  professions 
and  vocations  it  will  be  discovered  that  the  problems  encoun- 
tered and  the  qualifications  essential  do  not  differ  more  be- 
tween the  public  service  and  any  particular  branch  of  industry 
than  between  that  branch  and  some  other. 

One  single  class  of  employees,  too  inconsiderable  in  num- 
ber, however,  to  have  any  importance  for  the  present  discus- 
sion, may  be  regarded  as  actually  receiving  training  through 
the  type  of  instruction  above  outlined.  In  every  large  public 
service,  and  perhaps  particularly  in  municipalities,  a  limited 
number  of  persons  variously  designated  as  examiners  and  in- 
vestigators are  needed  whose  function  it  is  to  make  investi- 
gations of  various  phases  of  governmental  activity  for  the 
purposes  of  financial  control,  reorganization,  personnel  ad- 
ministration, or  for  other  administrative  purposes  associated 
with  the  central  control.  While  it  is  essential  that  technical 
advice  and  supervision  be  always  present,  it  is  often  found 
practicable  in  staffs  of  this  kind  to  put  to  excellent  use  per- 
sons of  native  capacity  and  alertness  who  do  not,  and  in  the 
nature  of  the  case  cannot,  possess  technical  knowledge  of  each 
of  the  varied  branches  of  administration  which  the  shifting 
requirements  of  the  central  agency  make  it  necessary  for  them 
to  investigate.  It  is  frequently  possible  to  find  excellent  ma- 
terial for  this  type  of  service  among  those  in  the  clerical  grades 
who  have  entered  without  any  advanced  educational  prepara- 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  BASIC  ASPECTS     353 

tion  and  who  have  acquired  through  long  experience  a  wide 
famiharity  with  the  operations  of  the  service.  But  it  is  also 
possible  and  frequently  desirable  to  recruit  these  staffs  from 
among  persons  of  good  general  education  but  without  exten- 
sive experience  in  the  service.  For  persons  of  this  type, 
specialized  courses  in  public  administration,  especially  when 
allied  with  "field  work,"  are  undoubtedly  of  value  as  a  prep- 
aration; but  the  demand  for  this  type  of  service  is  in  any 
case  too  small  to  warrant  the  provision  of  any  extensive  facili- 
ties for  the  purpose  or  to  be  any  real  element  in  a  program 
of  training  for  the  public  service,  and  in  large  services  it  will 
generally  be  found  both  practicable  and  expedient  to  divide 
'this  examining  work  functionally,  so  that  it  is  done  by  persons 
who  are  themselves  proficient  specialists  in  the  vocations  or 
professions  involved. 

Reviewing  these  considerations  in  the  light  of  the  needs 
of  the  federal  service  it  may  be  said  with  confidence  that  there 
exists  at  present  substantially  no  demand  for  recruits  to  the 
federal  service  the  supply  of  which  could  be  or  is  being  facili- 
tated by  the  provision  of  any  special  courses  of  training  of 
the  character  here  under   discussion. 

Maximum  Age  Limits. — Another  basic  aspect  of  the  re- 
cruitment problem  which  is  closely  related  to  the  question  of 
restricting  selection  for  the  higher  levels  to  those  already  in 
the  service,  is  that  of  maximum  age  limits  for  entrance  to  the 
service.  This  question,  of  course,  has  reference  chiefly  to  the 
positions  of  the  lower  grades,  and  of  a  more  or  less  unspecial- 
ized  character.  In  the  higher  grades,  where  extensive  train- 
ing and  experience  are  required,  if  recruitment  from  without 
the  service  is  resorted  to,  the  appointee  may  be  expected  to  be 
already  fairly  advanced  in  life;  and  here  the  desirability  of  fix- 
ing a  maximum  age  limit  will  be  merely  to  prevent  the  en- 
trance of  one  so  old  as  to  be  below  a  reasonable  standard  of 
productive  efflciency  or  of  adaptability.  In  the  lower  grades, 
however,  the  question  presents  itself  as  one  of  basic  principle. 

The  "imposition  for  these  grades,  of  a  low  maximum  age 
limit,  such  as  the  twenty-year  limit  for  second  division  clerks, 


354  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

and  the  twenty- four-year  limit  for  first  division  clerks,  as 
fixed  in  the  British  system,  is  often  urged.  The  argument  is 
that  the  aim  should  be  to  encourage  young  men  definitely  tp 
adopt  the  service  early  in  life  as  a  i:)ermanent  career.  Mani- 
festly such  an  argument  has  no  validity  except  in  respect  to 
the  upper,  really  w^orth  while  positions. 

A  danger,  of  course,  exists  that  if  no  moderately  low  maxi- 
mum age  limit  is  established  for  the  subordinate  positions, 
the  service  may  become  the  refuge  of  incompetents  of  middle 
age  or  even  of  advanced  years  who  have  failed  to  establish 
themselves  in  private  life.  If,  however,  the  entrance  gate  be 
strictly  guarded  as  regards  physical  as  well  as  mental  quali- 
fications, there  is  no  reason  why  an  incompetent,  of  whatever 
age,  should  gain  a  i3ermanent  foothold  in  the  service.  To 
assume  that  all  who  find  a  minor  post  in  the  government  serv- 
ice attractive  even  in  middle  life  are  necessarily  incompetent 
would  be  a  grievous  error  and  the  government,  as  employer, 
should  not  take  so  arbitrary  a  position  except  for  the  best  of 
reasons. 

If  extensive  training  and  experience  in  the  service  is  re- 
quired before  the  maximum  value  of  the  recruit  to  the  service 
is  attained,  the  recruitment  of  persons  well  on  in  years  is  ob- 
jectionable on  the  ground  that  the  cost  to  the  service  of  the 
period  of  apprenticeship,  so  to  speak,  is  distributed  over  a 
relatively  brief  prospective  period  of  service.  The  examin- 
ing corps  of  the  Patent  Office  is  a  case  in  point.  The  new 
examiner  must  spend  a  considerable  period  in  acquiring  a  mas- 
tery of  the  special  procedure  and  methods  involved  in  his 
work ;  and  during  that  period  his  services  are  ordinarily  worth 
less  than  their  cost.  In  theory,  therefore,  recruitment  should 
be  confined  to  persons  young  enough  to  warrant  the  expecta- 
tion of  a  long  period  of  service. 

In  sum,  the  policy  to  be  followed  by  the  federal  service 
would  seem  to  be  one  of  compromise.  Recruitment  should 
be  restricted  to  those  in  early  life  so  far  as  practicable,  but 
the  definition  of  what  is  to  be  regarded  as  early  life  should 
be  liberally  drawn,  probably  in  the  neighborhood  of  30  years. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  BASIC  ASPECTS     355 

and  perhaps  running  up  to  35.  The  present  policy  of  the 
service  in  the  permanent  branches  accords  fairly  well  with  the 
policy  recommended,  but  on  the  whole  the  tendency  is  to 
set  the  maximum  age  limit  at  a  considerably  higher  figure 
than  here  suggested. 

Recruitment  of  Women. — The  question  of  the  admission 
of  women  into  the  service  has  remained  up  to  the  present 
time  almost  solely  in  the  hands  of  the  administrative  officers 
concerned.  With  reference  to  "clerkships"  an  act  passed  in 
1870,  and  still  in  force,  definitely  vests  this  discretion  in  the 
heads  of  departments.^  A  like  discretion  is  extended  over  the 
remainder  of  the  competitive  classified  service  by  the  civil 
service  rules  which  provide  (Rule  VII,  Section  i,  a)  that  in 
certifying  the  names  of  eligibles  to  appointing  officers  "cer- 
tifications shall  be  made  without  regard  to  sex  unless  sex  is 
specified  in  the  request,"  thus  permitting  the  appointing  of- 
ficer, by  specifying  in  his  request  for  certification,  to  bar  ap- 
pointment to  either  sex,  a  privilege  commonly  used,  of  course^ 
to  bar  women  rather  than  men,  though  with  the  increasing 
employment  of  women  in  clerical  and  stenographic  work  in 
the  service,  the  situation  is  probably  by  the  way  of  becoming 
reversed.  In  the  foreign  service  the  regulations  for  entrance 
to  the  several  branches  promulgated  by  the  President  do  not 
in  terms  restrict  entrance  to  men,  but  such  is  undoubtedly  their 
intent,  and  a  woman  applicant,  should  one  present  herself, 
would  undoubtedly  be  denied  designation  to  the  examination. 
A  similar  situation  exists  with  reference  to  the  presidential 
postmasterships,  but  the  system  here  being  competitive,  it  is 
difficult  to  see  how  under  existing  orders  and  regulations  a 
woman  otherwise  qualified  could  be  denied  the  right  to  com- 
pete. In  the  labor  services,  and  in  all  the  other  unclassified 
positions,  there  exist  no  statutory  provisions,  and  the  discre- 
tion of  the  appointing  officer  is  complete. 

'"Women  may,  in  the  discretion  of  the  head  of  any  department,  be 
appointed  to  any  of  the  clerkships  therein  authorized  by  law  upon  the 
same  requisites  and  conditions  and  with  the  same  compensation  as  are 
prescribed  for  men."  Act  of  July  12,  1870.  Incorporated  in  Revised 
Statutes,   Section   165. 


356  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

There  can  be  no  question  but  that  the  discretion  entrusted 
to  appointing  officers  under  this  head  has  often  been  employed 
to  discriminate  against  the  employment  of  women  for  no 
sounder  reason  than  the  personal  preference  of  the  appointing 
officer  or  the  tradition  of  the  department.  Until  the  war 
emergency  compelled  a  change  there  were  whole  bureaus  in 
Washington  in  wdiich  the  employment  of  women  in  anything 
above  the  lowest  clerical  positions,  and  in  some  cases  even  in 
those  positions,  was  unknown;  and  despite  the  extreme  dif- 
ficulty which  was  experienced  at  various  times  in  securing  an 
adequate  supply  of  male  stenographers,  the  officers  in  charge 
persisted  in  their  refusal  to  employ  women.  In  the  technical 
positions  the  discrimination  has  been  much  less  common, 
owing  no  doubt  in  part  to  the  fact  that  only  a  very  small  pro- 
portion of  qualified  women  eligibles  have  ever  appeared  on 
the  registers.  Even  here,  however,  there  unquestionably  has 
been  discrimination  which  could  not  be  defended  on  any  sound 
administrative  grounds. 

In  view  of  this  condition,  which,  however  much  modified 
by  the  war,  still  tends  to  persist,  it  would  seem  desirable,  so 
far  as  the  classified  competitive  service  is  concerned,  to  amend 
the  rule,  and,  if  necessary,  the  statute,  by  requiring  that  cer- 
tification should  be  made  without  regard  to  sex  except  upon  a 
certificate  of  the  appointing  officer  to  be  approved  by  the  Civil 
Service  Commission,  that  administrative  reasons,  to  be  speci- 
fied, require  the  employment  of  only  one  sex.  A  more  sat- 
isfactory solution,  however,  would  be  the  examination  of  the 
whole  question  by  a  representative  central  personnel  body 
which  should  have  power  to  lay  down,  subject  perhaps  to  ap- 
proval by  the  President,  a  general  policy  on  this  head  and  to 
define  its  application  to  each  specified  branch  of  the  service 
and  each  class  of  positions,  such  determination  to  be  subject, 
of  course,  to  current  revision. 

Extreme  feminists  will  contend  doubtless  that  there  is  no 
need  for  this;  that  appointment  should  be  made  in  every  case, 
regardless  of  sex,  of  the  person  found  best  qualified  to  fill  the 
vacancy.     It  is  this  theory  which  doubtless  is  responsible  for 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  BASIC  ASPECTS     357 

the  measure  introduced  in  Congress  in  December,  19 19,  by 
Senator  McLean,  at  the  instance,  apparently,  of  the  Women's 
Trade  Union  League,  with  resi>ect  to  the  competitive  classi- 
fied service,  prohibiting  appointing  officers,  when  making  upon 
the  Civil  Service  Commission  request  for  certifications,  from 
specifying  sex  "unless  sex  is  a  physical  barrier  to  the  proper 
performance  of  the  duties  of  the  position  to  be  filled."  It 
is  believed,  however,  that  the  experience  of  all  large  personnel 
systems  is  that  it  is  better,  in  many  types  of  organization,  to 
confine  the  force  entrusted  with  a  given  class  of  work  entirely 
to  one  sex,  even  though  either  sex  is  qualified  for  the  work. 
If  determinations  on  this  head  are  made  after  full  considera- 
tion and  opportunity  for  hearing,  and  for  administrative  rea- 
sons made  of  public  record,  it  is  believed  that  unjust  sex  dis- 
crimination is  no  more  likely  to  result,  and  administrative 
requirements  are  more  likely  to  be  met,  than  through  the  en- 
actment of  a  rigid  statutory  rule  like  the  one  proposed. 
Basic  Questions  of  Practical  Procedure. — The  preceding 
sections  have  dealt  with  matters  of  general  policy  in  recruit- 
ment. It  remains  to  consider  certain  practical  matters  of 
actual  procedure  and  method  to  be  employed  in  selecting  re- 
cruits. The  questions  to  be  decided  under  this  head  are : 
first,  the  factors  upon  which  selection  will  be  determined,  such 
as  experience,  education,  and  technical  ability;  and,  in  con- 
nection with  each  of  these  factors,  the  requirement  to  be  es- 
tablished, and  particularly  the  minimum  requirement,  if  any, 
to  be  fixed,  and  the  relative  weight  to  be  assigned  to  each  fac- 
tor as  compared  with  the  others ;  second,  the  method  by  which 
the  candidate  may  be  required  to  demonstrate  his  qualifica- 
tions, whether  in  writing  or  through  an  interview  or  by  the 
perforniance  of  a  manual  task;  and  third,  the  method  of  bring- 
ing the  candidate  under  inspection,  whether  by  assembling 
the  candidates  at  one  place  or  a  number  of  places,  or  by  merely 
corresponding  with  the  candidates. 

The  first  question,  that  of  the  subjects  of  examination  and 
the  types  of  requirement,  is,  of  course,  the  basic  one,  yet  what 
is  practicable  in  this  regard  is  largely  dependent  upon   the 


358  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

method  that  is  feasible  for  bringing  the  candidate  under  in- 
spection and  for  securing  from  him  a  demonstration  of  his 
qualifications.  These  matters,  therefore,  must  be  given  at- 
tention first,  and  the  type  of  requirement  to  be  fixed  and  the 
weight  to  be  attached  to  each  subject  reserved  for  later  dis- 
cussion, in  the  light  of  the  considerations  here  developed. 

The  nomenclature  for  the  several  types  of  methods  and 
tests  which  has  developed  in  recruiting  practice,  particularly 
in  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  in  the  conduct  of  competi- 
tive examinations,  it  perhaps  should  be  said  in  passing,  is  not 
based  upon  any  close  analysis.  The  distinctions  about  to  be 
developed,  consequently,  at  some  points  cut  across  the  mean- 
ing attached  to  terms  commonly  used. 

Fully-Assembled,  Locally-Assembled,  and  Non-Assembled 
Examinations. — In  fully-assembled  examinations  all  the 
candidates  are  brought  together  in  one  place  and  at  one  time. 
In  what  are  here  designated  as  locally-assembled  examinations 
they  are  brought  together  in  a  number  of  places  at  the  same 
time,  and  in  a  non-assembled  examination  they  are  not  brought 
together  at  any  time. 

The  great  area  of  the  country  makes  impossible,  in  most 
examinations  for  the  federal  service,  the  assembling  of  all 
competitors  in  any  one  place  unless  the  examination  is  to  be 
held  for  a  position  existing  at  only  one  point,  and  is  to  be 
restricted  to  applicants  from  the  immediate  vicinity.  Such  is 
the  case  notably  in  connection  with  the  examinations  for  rural 
letter  carriers  and  the  like,  and  it  is  also  true  in  connection 
with  the  open  competitive  examinations  for  presidential  post- 
masters now   held  under  executive  order.  ^ 

In  the  examinations  for  the  foreign  service  conducted  by 
the  State  Department,  however,  the  assembled  examination  is 
employed,  though  the  whole  area  of  the  country  is  taken  as  the 
field  of  selection.     This  assembled  examination,  which  is  both 

*  In  the  latter  case  it  may  well  be  questioned  whether,  in  the  exam- 
ination for  the  more  important  offices,  competition  should  as  now  be 
restricted  to  the  residents  of  the  area  which  the  oflice  serves;  that  re- 
quirement being  in  force,  however,  it  is  practicable  in  these  examinations 
to  assemble  all  the  competitors  in  one  place. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  BASIC  ASPECTS     359 

written  and  oral,  is  preceded  by  a  non-assembled  test  in  which, 
on  the  basis  of  experience  and  other  general  statements,  the 
candidates  showing  no  promise  are  eliminated.  Nevertheless 
any  reasonably  qualified  person  seeking  appointment  to  the 
consular  service  must  journey  to  Washington  as  a  necessary 
incident  to  his  efforts,  to  submit  himself  to  examination,  with- 
out any  certainty  of  final  appointment.  That  this  require- 
ment is  calculated  to  discourage  competition  for  the  service 
seems  hardly  open  to  question,  particularly  when,  as  now, 
no  assurance  is  given  that  a  strictly  competitive  basis,  or  in- 
deed any  competitive  basis  at  all,  will  be  employed  in  making 
selection  from  among  those  examined. 

The  suggestion  made  on  this  point  by  the  Committee  on 
the  Foreign  Service  of  the  National  Civil  Service  Reform 
League,  which  recently  reported  on  the  general  subject  of  the 
foreign  service,  is  of  particular  interest.  The  Committee  em- 
phasized the  fact  that  the  holding  of  the  written  examinations 
for  the  foreign  service  in  all  parts  of  the  country  would  make 
it  possible  to  draw  to  the  service  a  much  larger  number  of 
applicants,  much  better  distributed  over  the  country  as  a  whole, 
since  the  present  practice  results  in  the  examination  of  an 
undue  proportion  of  persons  resident  in  and  near  Washington. 
With  respect  to  the  oral  examination,  the  committee  makes 
this  interesting  suggestion  :  ^ 

The  candidates  successful  in  passing  the  written  examina- 
tions might  perhaps  be  subjected  to  a  preliminary  oral  exam- 
ination by  the  Civil  Service  examiner  (at  the  local  examining 
point)  for  the  purpose  of  eliminating  those  candidates  whose 
personality  made  them  obviously  unfitted  for  entering  into  the 
foreign  service  .  .  .  and  perhaps  these  tests  would  be  suf- 
ficient to  exclude  the  utterly  unfit.     The  government  should 

^  Report  on  the  Foreign  Service,  National  Civil  Service  Reform 
League,  1919,  pp.  25-28.  The  Committee  makes  the  following  note  to 
this  statement :  "A  former  consul  has  w^ritten  to  the  committee  ex- 
pressing the  view  that  if  a  candidate  does  not  have  capital  enough  to  pay 
his  own  expenses  to  Washington  he  ought  not  to  be  encouraged  to  enter 
the  service  since  the  government  does  not  pay  consuls  for  some  time 
jafter  they  have  incurred  expenditures  and  because  there  are  incidental 
expenses  which  must  be  met  by  the  consul  out  of  his  own  pocket.  Much 
of  the  force  of  this  objection  will  be  gone  once  the  salaries  are  made 
adequate." 


36o  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

then  pay  the  transportation  to  Washington  for  the  oral  ex- 
amination for  the  candidates  successful  in  the  written  test  or 
it  might  examine  a  certain  number  from  the  head  of  each 
local  list,  reserving  the  remainder  for  later  calls.  This  .  .  . 
would  have  the  merit  of  preventing  the  exclusion  of  any  capa- 
ble young  man  simply  because  he  was  unable  to  make  the  trip 
to  Washington. 

For  many  of  the  positions  for  which  open  competitive 
examinations  are  held  in  the  competitive  classified  service  it  is 
impracticable  to  confine  competition  to  the  immediate  vicinity 
of  the  place  in  which  the  position  is  to  be  filled.  With  re- 
spect to  positions  at  Washington,  the  civil  service  law  requires 
that  equal  opportunity  be  given  to  candidates  anywhere  in  the 
country  to  compete.  Many  of  the  lists  are  employed,  more- 
over, for  filling  positions  at  a  variety  of  places.  The  appli- 
cability of  the  method  of  the  fully-assembled  examinations  to 
the  federal  service  is  thus  severely  limited  and  attention  must 
be  given,  therefore,  to  the  possibilities  of  the  other  two  types 
— the  locally-assembled  and  the  non-assembled.  Where  prac- 
ticable, however,  the  fully-assembled  examination  is  preferable 
to  the  other  two  types.  As  a  thoroughgoing  application  of 
the  competitive  principle  it  has  the  value  of  insuring  that  the 
several  candidates  will  be  examined  under  the  same  condi- 
tions. The  examination,  moreover,  can  be  conducted  by  more 
experienced  and  skilled  examiners  than  can  be  secured  in 
locally-assembled  examinations. 

Locally-assembled  examinations  are  of  two  kinds:  those 
in  which  the  examiners,  at  the  several  local  points,  merely 
place  before  the  candidates  the  written  questions  and  transmit 
the  answers,  whether  they  be  in  writing  or  in  the  form  of 
some  physical  product,  to  the  central  headquarters  for  rating; 
and  those  in  which  the  local  examiners  actually  rate  the  can- 
didates. 

In  the  former  case,  no  difficulty  arises  in  connection  with 
the  conventional  type  of  written  examination,  and  a  great 
majority  of  the  locally-assembled  examinations  conducted  by 
the  Civil   Service  Commission   for  the  competitive  classified 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  BASIC  ASPECTS      361 

service   for   other  than  mechanical   positions    fall   under   this 
head. 

The  non-assembled  test,  as  ordinarily  conducted  by  the 
Civil  Service  Commission  for  positions  in  the  competitive  clas- 
sified service,  frequently  consists  of  no  more  than  a  statement 
of  experience.  For  ascertaining  the  relative  qualifications 
of  competitors  under  this  head  the  non-assembled  method  is 
quite  satisfactory,  especially  when  supplemented,  as  is  in- 
creasingly the  case  with  the  federal  Civil  Service  Commission, 
by  correspondence  with  persons  to  whom  the  candidate  refers 
to  verify  the  candidate's  statements  and  to  give  an  inde- 
pendent opinion  on  his  qualifications.  Even  with  respect  to 
the  matter  of  experience,  however,  it  has  been  found  of  value 
in  local  jurisdictions  to  supplement  the  examination  of  the  rec- 
ord by  an  oral  examination,  which  has  the  merit  of  bringing 
out  frequently  not  merely  what  the  candidate  has  done  and,  in 
a  conventional  sense,  how  well  he  has  done  it,  but  how  much 
he  has  gotten  out  of  his  experience. 

As  already  indicated  the  non-assembled  test  is,  however, 
frequently  used  not  merely  to  obtain  a  record  of  the  candi- 
date's experience  but  to  get  evidence  of  his  technical  capacity, 
by  requiring  him  to  present  a  thesis  on  some  subject,  either 
set  or  left  to  him  to  select,  related  to  the  work  of  the  position, 
and,  in  rare  cases,  as  in  that  of  a  free-hand  draftsman,  by  re- 
quiring the  submission  of  samples  of  work  previously  done. 
The  obvious  difficulty  connected  with  a  non-assembled  written 
test  of  this  character  is  that  of  assuring  that  the  thesis  or 
samples  submitted  by  the  competitor  actually  represent  only 
his  own  work.  To  a  certain  extent  this  may  be  checked  up 
as  to  the  thesis  by  means  of  an  oral  test  at  a  subsequent  date, 
at  which  the  examiners  may  interrogate  the  candidate  on  the 
basis  of  the  subject  matter  of  his  thesis. 
Oral,  Written,  and  Manual  Tests. — While  the  terms  oral, 
written,  and  manual  tests  are  broadly  self-explanatory,  it  may 
be  well  to  call  attention  to  certain  points  in  their  relation  which 
might  not  at  first  sight  appear.  It  is  common  to  think  of  oral 
and  written  tests  as  being  of  the  question  and  answer  type; 


362  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

that  is,  tests  in  which  the  capacity  of  the  candidate  is  sought 
to  be  measured,  not  by  requiring  the  performance  of  any  of 
the  tasks  or  operations  which  fall  within  the  duties  of  the  posi- 
tion, but  merely  by  asking  questions  which  test  the  candidate's 
familiarity  with  those  duties;  and,  in  apparent  contra-distinc- 
tion  to  oral  and  written  tests,  manual  tests  frequently  have 
been  referred  to  in  the  nomenclature  of  the  Civil  Service 
Commission  as  "practical"  tests.  Although  the  distinction  is 
for  the  most  part  a  true  one,  oral  tests,  and  more  particularly 
written  tests,  may  be  fully  as  "practical"  as  are  manual  tests. 
Thus  an  examination  for  the  position  of  stenographer,  in 
which  the  candidate  is  required  to  take  notes  from  dictation 
and  to  transcribe  on  the  typewriter,  is  commonly  spoken  of 
as  a  written  examination  but  it  is,  in  every  respect,  as  "prac- 
tical" an  examination  as  are  the  manual  tasks  given  in  some 
jurisdictions  for  the  regular  mechanical  trades.  Less  obvious 
but  equally  clear  is  the  case  of  examination  for  bookkeeper  or 
accountant  in  which  it  is  perfectly  practical  to  set  actual  prob- 
lems through  a  written  examination;  and  the  list  might  be 
extended  into  other  less  common  types  of  posts. 

Oral  tests  admittedly  do  not  lend  themselves  in  any  great 
number  of  cases  to  a  "practical"  examination  in  the  sense  of 
requiring  the  actual  performance  of  characteristic  tasks;  they 
are  of  value  chiefly  in  testing  the  possession  of  certain  mental 
qualities  which  are  required  for  the  efficient  performance  of 
the  tasks  to  be  performed.  They  may  be  used,  however,  like 
the  written  examination  as  a  means  of  inquiring  into  the 
candidate's  education  and  technical  capacity.  The  advantage 
of  the  oral  test  on  this  head  is  realized,  how^ever,  only  when  the 
same  care  is  taken  in  the  rating  of  the  answers  made  by  the 
several  candidates  that  is  commonly  taken  in  the  rating  of 
written  papers.  The  employment  of  this  form  of  test  is, 
moreover,  open  to  the  obvious  objections  that  the  candidates 
are  not  subjected,  strictly  speaking,  to  the  same  tests ;  and  that 
it  is  difficult  to  review  the  judgment  of  the  examiners  when  the 
test  has  been  completed,  or  to  conceal  from  the  examiners  the 
identity  of  the  candidates  and  thus  prevent  the  entrance  of  im- 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  BASIC  ASPECTS      363 

proper  considerations.  These  considerations  are  strongest,  of 
course,  where  the  basis  of  examination  is  strictly  competitive.^ 

In  the  federal  service  the  use  of  the  oral  examination  is 
rendered  undesirable,  moreover,  by  the  difficulty  of  assembling 
all  the  candidates  in  one  place  before  a  single  board  of  ex- 
aminers. As  the  result  doubtless  of  all  these  factors  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  has  hitherto  made  little  use  of  the  oral 
examination  as  an  element  in  the  rating  of  candidates.  In  a 
number  of  cases,  hov^ever,  where  personality  is  regarded  as 
an  important  factor  in  the  qualifications  of  a  candidate,  and 
where  there  have  been  but  a  few  eligibles,  the  Commission 
has  followed  the  course  of  summoning  the  candidates  to  Wash- 
ington for  oral  tests  before  the  final  promulgation  of  the 
eligible  list,  the  purpose  of  such  test  being  simply  to  eliminate 
any  competitor  whose  personality  was  clearly  unsuitable. 
Under  this  procedure  the  final  stage  of  the  examination  by  the 
Commission  and  the  interview  of  the  candidates  by  the  ap- 
pointing officer,  which,  in  the  regular  course,  usually  follows 
some  time  after  the  completion  of  the  examination,  are  in 
effect  joined. 

The  oral  test,  it  should  be  said,  is  one  of  these  employed  in 
the  non-competitive  examinations  for  the  positions  of  consul 
and  diplomatic  secretary  and  for  medical  officers  in  the  Public 
Health  Service. 

The  use  of  manual  examinations  in  selecting  recruits  in 
the  skilled  trades  and  in  general  in  employments  requiring 
manual  skill  is  a  fairly  recent  development  in  the  field  of  pub- 
lic personnel  work.  In  industry,  this  class  of  service  is  re- 
cruited, of  course,  without  any  formal  test,  the  mere  fact  that 
one  claims  to  be  a  skilled  mechanic  in  a  given  line  being  ac- 
cepted as  a  sufficient  basis  and  little  attempt  Ijeing  made  to  dis- 
tinguish between  relative  grades  of  skill.     The  experience  of 

*  A  recent  discussion  of  the  values  of  the  oral  test  in  recruitment  for 
the  public  service — indeed  one  of  the  very  few  discussions  on  this  sub- 
ject to  be  found  anywhere — is  "The  Oral  Test  in  Civil  Service  Exam- 
inations," by  J.  B.  Probt,  Chief  Examiner,  St.  Paul  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission, a  paper  read  at  the  Eleventh  Annual  Meeting  of  the  National 
Assembly  of  Civil  Service  Commissions  and  published  in  the  Proceed- 
ings, p.  54  ff. 


364  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

certain  local  civil  service  commissions,  particularly  the  New 
York  City  commission,  in  conducting  manual  examinations 
for  skilled  trades  positions,  has  demonstrated  that  there  are 
wide  variations  in  efficiency  between  individuals  all  of  whom 
may  be  regarded  as  entitled  to  call  themselves  skilled  mechan- 
ics in  a  particular  line.  As  a  result  of  that  experience  it 
seems  clear  that,  in  the  recruitment  of  skilled  labor,  competi- 
tive selection,  based  upon  the  practical  manual  test,  may  be 
counted  on  to  result  in  the  recruitment  of  a  higher  average 
of  skilled  labor  than  do  the  ordinary  methods  of  industrial 
recruitment.  Up  to  the  present  time,  however,  the  federal 
commission  has  not  employed  this  method  in  the  recruitment 
of  skilled  mechanics  for  the  various  branches  of  the  govern- 
ment, chief  reliance  being  had  upon  statements  of  experience. 
Unquestionably  this  method,  requiring  as  it  does  the  provision 
of  adequate  facilities  in  the  way  of  plant,  tools,  and  of  ma- 
terials, and  a  skilled  examining  force,  is  an  expensive  one. 
Whether  the  incurring  of  this  expense  would  be  warranted, 
under  the  conditions  encountered  in  the  federal  service,  is  an 
open  question.  One  reason  why  the  Commission  has  not  taken 
steps  in  this  direction  doubtless  has  been  that  such  examinations 
would  often  have  to  be  held  at  points  where  it  has  no  tech- 
nically qualified  representative. 

Experience  Tests. — Whether  any  practical  experience 
shall  be  required  of  a  candidate  is,  as  has  already  been  pointed 
out,  a  question  of  expediency  rather  than  principle. 

More  or  less  arbitrary  requirements  of  a  stated  length  of 
experience  are  not  uncommonly  met  with  in  the  requirements 
announced  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  for  positions  in 
the  competitive  classified  service.  In  practice  the  applications 
of  persons  who  do  not  possess  the  prescribed  requirements, 
but  who  have  ventured,  nevertheless,  to  file  applications,  are 
frequently  approved  by  the  Commission's  examiners  on  the 
ground  that  the  experience  presented  by  such  persons  is  a 
reasonable  equivalent  to  the  prescribed  requirement.  This 
practice  is  a  wholly  sound  one,  but  the  Commission  should  give 
public  notice  of  the  practice  by  stating  in  its  announcements  of 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  BASIC  ASPECTS     365 

requirements  that  equivalent  experience  to  that  stated  will  be 
accepted.  This  is  now  done  in  some  cases  but  it  is  not  the 
general  rule. 

In  the  competitive  classified  service,  the  experience  test  is 
commonly  employed  for  two  classes  of  positions  :  technical,  and 
those  in  the  skilled  trades.  It  is  not  employed  in  examina- 
tions for  the  common  run  of  clerical,  sub-clerical,  or  non-tech- 
nical inspection  positions. 

In  the  foreign  service  no  experience  requirement  is  set, 
but  experience,  it  is  needless  to  say,  is  taken  into  consideration 
in  the  selection  of  candidates  for  examination,  and  again,  pre- 
sumably, in  their  selection  for  appointment.  In  the  case  of 
medical  officers  of  the  Public  Health  Service,  since  admission 
is  only  to  the  lowest  grade,  which  is  recruited  from  the  ranks 
of  young  medical  graduates,  the  one  requirement  is  that  of  a 
year  of  hospital  experience,  or  of  two  years'  professional 
practice. 

Both  where  the  qualifying  experience  test  is  employed,  and 
where  no  such  test  is  used  but  a  mere  statement  of  previous 
history  and  employment  accepted  from  the  candidate,  it  is  in 
the  highest  degree  desirable  that  investigation  be  made  to  deter- 
mine the  truthfulness  of  the  competitor's  statement.  Investiga- 
tion along  this  line  frequently  reveals  not  only  false  statements 
made  by  competitors  but  concealment  on  their  part  of  facts 
tending  to  disqualify  them  for  the  service. 

In  the  competitive  classified  service  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission, to  the  extent  that  it  makes  investigation  at  all,  usually 
permits  the  results  of  the  investigation  to  be  taken  into  ac- 
count in  the  rating ;  ^  and  the  same  is  true  in  the  examinations 
which  it  conducts  for  presidential  postmaster.  Here,  more- 
over, the  customary  investigation  by  correspondence  is  sup- 
plemented, in  the  case  of  examinations  for  offices  having  a 
compensation  of  over  $2,400,  by  a  "careful  personal  inves- 
tigation of  each  applicant  by  representatives  of  the  Civil  Serv- 
ice Commission,  one  of  whom  is  selected  by  the  Commission 

*The  mechanical  positions  in  the  industrial  establishments  are  an 
important  exception  to  this  statement. 


366  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

from  the  Post  Office  Department,"  In  making  such  inves- 
tigations the  investigators,  of  course,  are  not  confined  to  the 
verification  of  statements  made  by  the  candidate  but  are  at 
Hberty  to  make  inquiry  from  "persons  best  quaHfied  to  know 
the  business  qualifications,  abihty,  and  experience  of  each  can- 
didate." In  the  case  of  the  foreign  service  and  the  PubHc 
HeaUh  Service  a  similar  investigation,  confined  wholly  to  cor- 
respondence, is  conducted. 

Independent  investigation  of  the  candidate,  whether  for 
rating  or  merely  for  verification,  is  a  comparatively  recent 
development  in  recruiting  the  competitive  classified  service, 
since  the  Commission,  for  lack  of  funds,  has  been  compelled 
to  leave  this  matter  wholly  to  the  appointing  officer.  Even 
from  the  standpoint  of  verification  alone,  this  method  was 
obviously  improper,  since  the  appointing  officer  would  not  have 
the  time,  ordinarily,  to  conduct  the  necessary  investigation  in 
advance  of  selecting  the  eligible  for  appointment  and  would 
thus  be  compelled  to  appoint  in  ignorance  of  facts  which,  when 
later  disclosed,  might  call  for  the  dismissal  of  the  eligible  ap- 
pointed, a  duty  always  unpleasant  and  seldom  actually  resorted 
to  except  for  the  gravest  of  reasons.  In  19 13,  owing  to  the 
increase  of  its  force,  the  Commission  was  able  to  make  a  good 
beginning  in  the  direction  of  itself  conducting  the  necessary 
investigation.  In  1914,  the  Chief  Examiner  commented  as 
follows  on  this  phase  of  the  Commission's  work: 

The  value  of  confidential  vouchers  as  a  means  to  ascertain 
the  personal  fitness  and  integrity  of  applicants  for  examina- 
tion has  been  mentioned  in  previous  reports,  and  in  last  year's 
report  the  extended  use  of  such  vouchers  was  recorded  and 
still  further  extension  of  their  use  was  advocated.  During  the 
past  year  these  inquiries  have  been  used  to  a  much  greater 
extent  than  ever  before,  and  the  results  have  served  to  em- 
phasize more  strongly  than  ever  the  advantages  which  would 
accrue  to  the  service  if  it  were  possible  to  extend  the  system 
to  practically  all  examinations.  By  means  of  confidential  in- 
quiries in  letter  form  it  has  been  jjossible  to  obtain  accurate 
and  reliable  information  regarding  the  qualifications  and  per- 
sonal fitness  of  applicants  in  all  kinds  of  positions  from  the 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  BASIC  ASPECTS      367 

highest  to  the  lowest.  The  system  conies  next  in  value  to 
personal  investigation.  It  has  been  extensively  used  in  con- 
nection with  rural  carrier  and  fourth  class  postmaster  exam- 
inations where  charges  of  unfitness  have  been  made  by  patrons. 
It  is  believed  that  confidential  inquiries  should  be  used  in 
all  examinations  except  possibly  those  for  the  post  office  serv- 
ice, which  are  usually  held  only  at  the  places  of  employment, 
where  the  postmasters  have  every  facility  for  investigating 
the  suitability  of  eligibles  certified  to  them  for  selection.  For 
the  service  in  Washington  or  for  positions  for  which  the  nomi- 
nating or  appointing  officer  is  stationed  at  a  place  remote  from 
that  where  the  examination  may  be  held,  it  is  believed  that 
these  inquiries  should  be  made.  So  great  an  extension  of  the 
system  would,  however,  materially  increase  the  work  of  the 
application  division  and  would  not  be  practicable  without  the 
employment  of  a  number  of  additional  clerks  in  that  divi- 
sion.^ 

Education  Tests. — The  extent  to  which  education,  whether 
general  or  technical,  should  be  emphasized  in  making  selection 
already  has  been  discussed  in  the  preceding  section.  Here 
the  principal  question  that  presents  itself  is  the  methods  by 
which  the  possession  of  educational  attainments  shall  be  evi- 
denced. 

When  educational  qualifications  are  under  discussion,  the 
assumptiqn  is  usually  made  that  the  reference  is  to  formal 
schooling  obtained  in  recognized  educational  institutions. 
Needless  to  say,  however,  in  numerous  instances  substantially 
the  same  educational  attainments  have  been  acquired  by  home 
study  and  self -instruction  that  are  commonly  obtained  through 
attendance  at  educational  institutions.  From  the  standpoint 
of  personnel  theory  there  is,  of  course,  no  reason  why  one 
who  has  obtained  his  education  in  this  way  should  not  be  re- 
garded in  every  respect  equal  to  one  who  has  pursued  more 
conventional  methods.  Indeed,  there  is  some  reason  for  sup- 
posing that  in  the  average  case,  other  things  being  equal,  the 
self -instructed  person  is  possessed  of   greater  native  ability 

*  Thirty-first  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1914),  p.  29.  While  no  mention  has  been  made  of  this  matter  in  re- 
cent reports  of  the  Commission,  the  fact  is  that  there  still  remains  a 
considerable  field  to  which  this  procedure  could  and  should  be  applied. 


368  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

and  has  actually  acquired  a  firmer  grasp  upon  the  subject 
matter  of  his  studies  than  has  the  other. 

From  the  standpoint  of  the  actual  administration  of  a  re- 
cruitment system,  however,  the  matter  of  testing  the  educa- 
tional attainments  of  one  who  has  completed  no  regular  course 
of  instruction  presents  serious  difficulties.  The  only  way  in 
which  the  test  may  be  made  is  by  an  extensive  and  thorough- 
going examination;  and  this  applies  equally  to  technical  as 
well  as  to  general  or  academic  education.  The  difficulties, 
under  any  circumstances,  in  giving  a  really  extensive  test  of 
this  kind  in  connection  with  the  ordinary  position  are  obvi- 
ous. They  are  especially  great  in  connection  with  the  admin- 
istration of  the  recruitment  systems  of  the  federal  government 
because  of  the  difficulty,  except  when  the  number  of  candi- 
dates is  large,  of  assembling  the  candidates  in  any  one  place 
or  even  in  several  places  for  examination  of  this  kind.  Be- 
cause of  the  difficulties  involved  the  tendency  of  the  Civil 
Service  Commission,  in  recruiting  for  positions  in  the  com- 
petitive classified  service,  has  been  to  employ  evidence  of  the 
completion  of  a  course  of  instruction  at  a  recognized  insti- 
tution as  the  sole  means  of  testing  the  possession  of  educa- 
tional attainments  whether  general  or  technical.  Unquestion- 
ably this  tendency  involves  a  certain  measure  of  injustice  to 
those  who  have  acquired  the  necessary  education  without  such 
formal  attendance,  and  it  seems  to  run  counter  to  the  popular 
feeling  that  positions  in  the  public  service  should  be  open  to 
all  who  are  qualified  regardless  of  technical  or  arbitrary  re- 
quirements. Nevertheless  it  is  difficult  to  see  how,  in  the  situ- 
ation confronting  the  recruiting  authorities  of  the  federal  gov- 
ernment, this  difficulty  can  be  avoided. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that,  in  the  examinations  for  the 
foreign  service,  no  rc(|uirement  of  formal  schooling  is  made 
by  the  State  Department.  The  service  is  preeminently  one 
which  the  tradition  of  other  countries  would  dictate  should 
be  recruited  exclusively  from  the  ranks  of  those  who  have 
received  a  considerable  amount  of  formal  schooling.  It  is  not 
believed,  however,  that  our  foreign  service  has  suffered  in  any 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  BASIC  ASPECTS     369 

degree   from  the  lack  of  this  requirement  in   the   testing  of 
candidates. 

In  positions  of  a  lower  grade,  the  actual  testing  of  the  edu- 
cational attainments  of  the  candidate  presents  less  difficulty. 
Even  here,  however,  the  requirement  of  a  minimum  of  formal 
education  is  employed  in  some  systems.  The  purpose  is  to  pre- 
vent an  excessive  number  of  competitors,  both  by  discouraging 
those  not  possessing  the  stated  minimum  from  making  applica- 
tion, and  by  eliminating,  without  further  examination,  many  of 
those  who  do  apply,  the  larger  portion  of  whom  would  doubt- 
less be  disqualified  if  permitted  to  take  further  written  or  prac- 
tical examination.  This  use  of  the  minimum  educational  re- 
quirement is  justifiable  from  the  standpoint  of  the  practical 
necessities  of  a  large  competitive  examination  system.  It 
eliminates  a  large  volume  of  work  which  would  otherwise  be 
expended  in  examining  competitors  whose  chances  of  appoint- 
ment would  be  at  best  remote,  and  whose  elimination  in  any 
case  has  no  adverse  effect  on  the  quality  of  the  eligible  reg- 
ister finally  produced.  Nevertheless,  this  method  runs  counter 
to  the  popular  feeling  that  entrance  to  the  public  service  should 
be  open  to  all  those  qualified,  and  that  requirements  arbitrarily 
imposed  for  the  convenience  of  the  system  are  an  infringement 
upon  the  rights  of  those  barred  by  such  requirements.  It  is 
particularly  desirable  that  such  a  feeling  should  not  arise  in 
this  connection,  because  the  lower  the  grade  of  the  examina- 
tion the  larger  the  number  of  potential  competitors. 

The  practice  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  on  the  whole, 
has  been  well-considered  on  this  point.  Despite  the  continu- 
ous pressure  of  work  on  its  examining  force,  it  has  resisted, 
in  most  cases,  the  temptation  to  impose  in  the  lower  grades 
arbitrary  requirements  of  schooling.  In  its  examinations  for 
entrance  to  the  lower  clerical  grades,  and  to  the  position  of 
carrier  in  the  Post  Office  Department,  it  has  not  imposed,  even 
during  the  period  when  there  was  an  oversupply  of  appli- 
cants the  requirement  of  a  common  school  education. 
Technical  Capacity  Tests. — The  desirability  of  applying 
some  test  of  technical  capacity  to  applicants,  even  though  their 


370  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

experience  seems  clearly  to  demonstrate  that  they  possess  tech- 
nical capacity,  has  already  been  commented  on.  The  test  of 
technical  capacity  is  peculiarly  a  competitive  test,  and,  unless 
it  can  be  framed  so  that  it  really  serves  as  a  fair  basis  of  com- 
parison betvcfeen  candidates,  it  had  better  be  omitted  alto- 
gether where  an  experience  test  has  already  been  applied.  If 
it  can  be  made  actually  indicative  of  the  relative  abilities  of 
the  candidates,  however,  it  furnishes  a  valuable  aid  to  selec- 
tion which  should  be  employed  so  far  as  possible. 

Tests  of  technical  capacity  may  be  said  to  fall  roughly  into 
two  classes,  which,  for  want  of  better  terms,  may  be  desig- 
nated as  the  "question  and  answer"  type  and  the  "practical 
problem"  type.  In  the  question  and  answer  type  of  test,  the 
attempt  is  made  to  elicit  the  candidate's  knowledge  of  the  tech- 
nical subject  matter  by  means  of  interrogatories.  The  prac- 
tical problem  type  consists  in  actually  placing  before  the  can- 
didate a  typical  problem  such  as  he  is  likely  to  encounter  in 
his  work  and  to  require  a  solution  in  substantially  the  form 
in  which  it  would  be  required  in  actual  practice.  Clearly 
tests  of  this  type  may  be  given  most  readily  where  the  work 
itself  involves  the  use  of  no  facilities  or  implements  other  than 
paper  and  pen,  the  typewriting  machine,  the  drafting  board, 
etc.  It  may  be  applied,  however,  and  is  currently  applied  with 
success,  in  the  practice  of  several  local  commisisons,  in  tests 
of  competency  in  the  mechanical  trades  where  more  or  less 
elaborate  equipment  must  be  employed.  It  should  be  noted 
further,  of  course,  that  the  positions,  in  which  books,  paper, 
and  pen  are  all  the  facilities  that  are  needed  for  the  application 
of  a  practical  test,  are  by  no  means  confined  to  the  lower  order 
of  clerical  positions.  They  embrace  also  at  least  some  aspects 
of  the  highest  legal,  accounting,  engineering,  statistical,  and 
administrative  positions.  Indeed,  the  extent  to  which  the  test 
of  practical  problems  may  be  applied  in  what  seems  like  a 
formal  examination  is  usually  not  appreciated  by  those  who 
have  not  had  contact  with  the  matter,  and  the  use  of  formal 
examination  methods  for  the  higher  grades  of  positions  is 
consequently  held  in  lower  esteem  than  it  should  be. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  EASIC  ASPECTS     371 

The  difficulties  in  conducting  assembled  examinations,  as 
already  indicated,  have  reduced  to  a  minimum  the  possibility 
of  assembled  tests  of  technical  capacity  for  the  great  majority 
of  positions  in  the  federal  service,  and,  as  has  also  been  com- 
mented on,  the  non-assembled  tests  for  technical  positions  are 
unreliable.  As  a  result,  the  federal  commission  has  relied 
upon  its  experience  and  education  tests  alone  to  a  far  greater 
degree  than  do  the  more  progressive  local  commissions.  It 
should  be  kept  in  mind  always  that  this  practice  of  the  federal 
service  is  the  child  of  "necessity  and  that  so  far  as  practical 
conditions  permit,  the  testing  of  technical  capacity  should  be 
employed  in  a  competitive  system. 

It  goes  v^ithout  saying  that  a  test  of  technical  capacity  is 
no  test  at  all  unless  the  subject  matter  with  which  it  deals, 
whether  by  question  and  answer  or  by  practical  problem,  is 
relevant  to  the  duties  of  the  position  for  which  selection  is 
to  be  made.  It  is  unfortunately  a  true  criticism  of  the  work 
of  not  a  few  civil  service  commissions  that  the  tests  of  tech- 
nical capacity  which  they  set  frequently  have  only  a  theoretical 
bearing  on  the  duties  of  the  position  in  question.  This  criti- 
cism is  not  applicable,  generally  speaking,  to  the  federal  com- 
mission. 

The  range  of  subjects  and  positions  covered  by  the  tests 
of  technical  capacity  set  by  the  federal  commission  is  so  wide 
that  it  would  be  impossible,  even  were  the  means  of  appraisal 
much  more  available  than  they  are  now,  to  characterize  in  a 
single  statement  the  quality  of  these  tests — the  appropriate- 
ness of  the  questions  set  and  the  judgment  used  in  the  rating. 
It  may  be  said,  however,  that,  on  the  whole,  the  written  tests 
of  the  federal  commission  bear  a  high  repute  among  examin- 
ing boards  the  country  over;  and  complaints  against  them  on 
the  score  of  inappropriateness  of  questions  are  decidedly  un- 
common. 

Where  the  subject  matter  of  the  technical  examination  is 
appropriate  and  where  it  may  be  reduced  to  a  basis  of  prac- 
tical problems,  the  weight  of  at  least  half  the  examination 
usually  may  safely  be  given  to  this  test.     The  present  prac- 


S72  THE  FEDERAL  SER\ICE 

tice  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  seems  to  err,  if  anything, 
on  the  side  of  giving  too  Httle  weight  to  tlie  technical  test  when 
such  a  test  is  applied,  though  this  general  statement  is  neces- 
sarily subject  to  the  qualification  that  it  has  no  application  to 
many  of  the  tests  held  by  the  Commission, 

The  technical  tests  applied  in  examination  for  the  consular 
and  diplomatic  services  are  necessarily  of  a  rather  elementary 
character  inasmuch  as  the  theory  of  recruitment  here  is  that 
the  persons  applpng  will  obtain  a  knowledge  of  their  duties 
after  appointment.  From  an  examination  of  recent  questions 
set  in  these  examinations,  however,  it  would  seem  that  they 
could  profitably  be  given  the  character  of  practical  problems 
to  a  larger  extent  than  at  present. 

Psychological  Tests. — A  subject  of  test  which  has  come 
into  prominence  witliin  recent  years,  particularly  in  the  re^ 
cruiting  methods  of  certain  industries  rather  than  in  those  of 
the  public  service,  is  that  of  the  psychological  characteristics 
of  the  several  candidates.  The  examination  designed  to  test 
the  candidates  on  this  point  is  commonly  referred  to  as  the 
psychological  test.  The  object  of  this  method  is  to  test  the 
possession  by  the  candidate  of  certain  mental  qualities  or  apti- 
tudes, such  as  alertness,  coolness,  quickness  of  eye.  shortness 
of  reaction  time,  etc..  and  the  tests  are  designed  specitically 
with  a  view  to  bringing  out  these  points,  having  no  direct  rela- 
tion, therefore,  to  the  specific  duties  of  the  position  in  ques- 
tion. 

The  accuracy  of  the  indications  obtained  by  these  tests 
has  been  challenged  by  many,  the  contention  being  that  the 
form  of  the  tests  themselves  and  the  artificial  conditions  under 
which  they  are  given,  as  well  as  the  rather  unreal  nature  of  the 
questions  asked  or  problems  put.  make  the  results  of  no  value 
for  practical  purposes.  This  view  seems  somewhat  extreme. 
On  the  other  hand  it  is  doubtless  true  that  exaggerated  claims 
have  been  made  for  the  value  of  tests  of  tliis  character.  They 
seem  to  have  special  value,  as  appears  to  have  been  well  estab- 
lished by  the  experience  of  the  army  during  the  war,  in  se- 
lecting persons   for  training  along  special  lines,  the  purpose 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  BASIC  ASPECTS     373 

here  being  chiefly  to  discover  aptitudes.  It  should  be  noted, 
however,  that  in  this  case  the  psychological  test  is  applied  in 
the  absence  of  any  other  availal^le  indication,  and  it  does  not 
follow  that  great  weight  need  be  given  to  this  type  of  test  when 
recruitment  is  being  carried  on  for  a  specified  position,  in  the 
duties  of  which  the  candidates  are  already  trained  and  compe- 
tent, and  tests  directly  applicable  to  those  duties,  therefore, 
may  be  employed. 

Up  to  the  present  time  the  Civil  Service  Commission  has 
made  virtually  no  use  of  the  psychological  test  in  its  recruit- 
ment work,  and  the  same  is  true  of  the  examining  methods  of 
the  foreign  service  and  the  Public  Health  Service.  Did  the 
Civil  Service  Commission  have  a  larger  staff  of  examiners 
available,  some  interesting  results  might  be  secured  by  the  ex- 
perimental application  of  this  form  of  test.  Many  of  the 
tests  of  this  character  depend  for  their  efficacy  upon  the  person 
conducting  the  test,  and  attention  has  been  called  already  to 
the  difficulties  under  which  the  Commission  labors  in  attempt- 
ing to  conduct  at  widely  scattered  points  any  types  of  test  in 
which  the  personality  or  proficiency  of  the  examiner  is  an 
element.-^ 

The  experience  of  the  Commission  with  the  psychological 
test  is  well  summarized  in  the  1919  report  of  the  Chief  Ex- 
aminer : 

For  some  time  before  the  war  the  commission  had  given 
serious  consideration  to  the  suggestions  of  certain  college  pro- 
fessors of  psychological  tests  for  selecting  salesmen,  clerks, 
and  other  classes  of  employees,  but  felt  there  was  not  sufficient 
data  of  results  available  to  justify  substituting  such  tests  for 
examinations  which  were  securing  satisfactory  employees. 
Delay  in  rating  papers,  however,  has  always  been  a  matter  of 
much  concern  to  the  commission,  because  it  has  resulted  in 
considerable  loss  to  the  government  in  declinations  of  appoint- 
ment from  well  qualified  eligibles  whose  papers  had  not  been 

*  For  a  more  extended  discussio_n  of  the  values  of  the  psychological 
test,  see  "Psychological  Tests  in  Civil  Service  Examination,"  by  F.  E. 
Doty,  Chief  Examiner,  Los  Angeles  County  Civil  Service  Commission, 
a  paper  read  at  the  Eleventh  Annual  Meeting  of  the  National  Assembly 
of  Civil  Service  Commissioners,  1918,  and  published  in  their  Proceed- 
ings, p.  41. 


374  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

rated  until  after  several  weeks,  or  even  months,  had  elapsed 
since  the  data  of  the  examination :  and  the  psychological  tests 
have  the  advantage  of  quick  rating. 

For  positions  in  Washington  the  commission  is  required  by- 
law to  announce  the  examinations  throughout  the  United 
States,  and  when  the  examination  is  that  for  clerk,  which  re- 
quires no  preliminary  experience,  there  are  usually  several 
thousand  competitors  and  consequent  congestion  in  the  ex- 
amining or  rating  division.  Any  type  of  test,  therefore,  which 
would  reduce  the  time  for  rating,  and  at  the  same  time  have 
as  good  or  better  results  in  the  class  of  eligibles  secured,  is 
to  be  sought  after.  Do  the  so-called  psychological  tests  meet 
the  second  and  all-important  requirement  as  they  admittedly 
meet  the  first? 

These  new  tests  have  been  proposed  thus  far  by  their  ad- 
vocates only  for  positions  requiring  no  special  mechanical, 
technical,  or  scientific  skill  or  knowledge ;  in  other  words,  posi- 
tions similar  to  those  for  which  this  commission  gives  a  gen- 
eral educational  test.  The  largest  groups  of  these  positions 
in  the  government  service  are  rural  carriers,  fourth  class  post- 
masters, clerks  and  carriers  in  city  post  offices,  railway  mail 
clerks,  and  first  grade  clerks  in  the  departments  in  Washing- 
ton and  at  field  establishments. 

Through  the  courtesy  of  officers  of  the  Army,  the  Army 
alpha  psychological  test  was  given  under  Army  direction  to 
105  of  the  commission's  employees,  and  the  results  compared, 
in  charts  and  tables,  with  the  grades  attained  by  these  em- 
ployees in  the  commission's  examinations  and  with  the  effi- 
ciency ratings  of  these  persons  as  reported  by  their  chiefs  of 
division.  Of  the  employees  examined,  70  had  been  appointed 
from  the  first  grade  clerk  examination,  and  these  were  divided 
into  groups  of  5  each  for  purposes  of  comparison.  A  de- 
tailed description  of  the  results  of  this  comparison  could  be 
given,  with  consideration  of  methods  pursued  and  a  statement 
as  to  individual  exceptions,  but  in  this  brief  report  it  is  suf- 
ficient to  state  that  using  the  units  of  five  employees  as  the 
standard,  the  employees  who  attained  the  highest  ratings  in 
the  commission's  entrance  examinations  likewise  attained  the 
highest  ratings  in  the  psychological  test,  and  their  ratings  in 
the  commission's  examinations  were  as  closely  related  to  their 
relative  efficiency  as  were  their  ratings  in  the  psychological 
examination. 

It  would  seem,  therefore,  that  if  the  psychological  test  had 
the  same  result  in  all  respects  as  the  commission's  first  grade 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  BASIC  ASPECTS      375 

clerk  examination,  it  should  be  adopted  as  the  entrance  test, 
because  of  its  advantage  in  rapidity  of  rating.  Let  us  exam- 
ine the  psychological  tests  on  the  basis  of  comparative  results 
with  the  present  educational  tests. 

In  the  first  place,  they  do  not  afford  a  test  in  penmanship, 
brief  or  one-word  answers  only  being  required  to  their  ques- 
tions, and  speed  in  answering  being  a  principal  element.  There 
is  no  direct  test,  as  in  the  letter  writing  or  report  writing  sub- 
ject, of  ability  to  write  a  connected  intelligent  letter  or  simple 
composition  on  a  given  subject.  To  include  these  subjects  in 
a  form  of  psychological  test  would  reduce  the  latter's  advan- 
tage in  speed  of  rating.  Again,  only  in  a  minor  way,  and  in 
the  simplest  forms  of  examples,  do  the  psychological  examina- 
tions test  knowledge  of  arithmetic,  and  experience  of  many 
years  shows  clearly  that  the  most  efficient  clerks  in  the  gov- 
ernment service  attained  high  ratings  in  the  subject  of  arith- 
metic as  given  in  the  present  form  of  examination.  More- 
over, much  of  the  government's  clerical  work  has  to  do  with 
figures,  and,  therefore,  in  any  entrance  examination  emphasis 
must  be  placed  on  ability  to  figure.  Adding  the  subject  of 
arithmetic,  or  increasing  the  difficulty  of  the  minor  figuring 
test  now  included  in  the  psychological  examinations,  would 
still  further  reduce,  if  not  wholly  eliminate,  their  advantage 
in  speed  of  rating. 

Another  consideration,  and  an  important  one,  entering  into 
the  question  of  the  form  of  examination  to  be  prescribed  by 
the  commission  for  entrance  to  the  service  is  its  effect  on  the 
public  at  large.  The  public  has  been  educated  in  the  funda- 
mental subjects  of  spelling,  arithmetic,  penmanship,  and  Eng- 
lish and  understands  examinations  based  on  those  subjects. 
The  psychological  tests  have  not  yet  been  generally  accepted; 
and  it  is  only  within  the  past  year  or  two  that  prominent  edu- 
cators have  expressed  themselves  forcefully  in  the  better  maga- 
zines against  the  laboratory  methods  of  certain  professors  of 
psychology  in  dealing  with  human  beings. 

The  examination  problem  is  peculiarly  the  commission's, 
and  it  is  always  under  consideration  with  a  view  to  such  im- 
provement from  time  to  time  as  will  meet  the  requirement  of 
the  civil  service  act  that  the  commission's  examinations  shall 
be  practical  in  character.  The  psychological  examinations  are 
being  given  serious  consideration,  and  in  a  new  examination 
recently  held  by  the  commission  for  the  position  of  check  and 
bond  sorter  in  the  Treasury  Department  the  first  subject  was 
based  on  one  of  the  psychological  tests  in  figuring.     Statistics 


376  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

of  this  examination,  however,  are  not  yet  available  from  which 
to  express  an  opinion  as  to  the  practicability  of  the  test. 

Arrangements  have  been  completed  with  a  prominent  psy- 
chologist to  make  an  exhaustive  study  of  various  types  of 
examination  tests  with  a  view  to  determining  their  practica- 
bility for  the  commission's  purposes.  In  order  to  expedite 
rating,  however,  and  because  of  its  limited  appropriation,  the 
commission  itself  is  considering  the  matter  of  reducing  the 
length  of  examinations  now  being  given  for  clerical  positions.^ 

Personality  Tests. — Closely  related  to  the  psychological 
test  is  the  test  of  "personality,"  so  called.  This  test  is  mani- 
festly applicable  only  to  those  positions  in  which  the  personality 
of  the  incumbent  is  an  important  factor  in  success.  Since  the 
method  of  testing  personality  is  almost  invariably  to  bring  the 
candidate  before  an  examining  board  for  interview,  the  per- 
sonality test  suffers  from  the  inherent  disadvantages  of  the 
oral  test  already  referred  to.  In  addition,  it  suffers  from  the 
obvious  difficulty  of  establishing  in  so  elusive  a  matter  as 
personality  any  concrete  standards  of  comparative  rating,  and 
of  avoiding  the  injection  of  the  honest  prejudices  and  personal 
reactions  of  the  examiners  into  the  rating.  For  these  reasons 
it  is  believed  that  an  oral  test  of  personality,  if  employed  at 
all,  should  be  given  little  if  any  weight  in  determining  the 
final  ratings  of  the  candidate,  but  it  may  be  usefully  employed 
as  a  means  for  eliminating  candidates  whose  personality  ren- 
ders them  entirely  unsuitable  for  the  position.  It  may  be 
questioned,  however,  whether  even  for  this  purpose  it  is  neces- 
sary in  ordinary  cases,  inasmuch  as  the  experience  test  should 
be,  in  most  cases,  an  adequate  assurance  that  the  candidates 
who  are  qualified  for  appointment  possess  at  least  a  minimum 
of  qualification  in  the  way  of  personality. 

The  test  of  personality  is  seldom  separately  listed  and 
weighed.  It  is  the  common  practice,  both  in  the  federal  service 
in  those  examinations  in  which  oral  tests  are  employed,  and 
in  the  practice  of  civil  service  commissions  generally,  to  employ 
an  "oral  test"  without  announcement  of  the  subjects  which 

*  Thirty-sixth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1919),  p.  xxxi   ff. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  BASIC  ASPECTS     377 

are  to  be  covered  by  such  oral  test.  Frequently  the  test  is  in 
fact  a  combination  of  experience,  education,  technical  capacity, 
and  personality  tests,  no  separate  rating,  however,  being  ob- 
tained on  these  several  points,  the  whole  being  lumped  in  one 
rating.  Such  an  arrangement  is  manifestly  undesirable.  If 
education,  experience,  and  technical  capacity  have  been  cov- 
ered already  by  tests  specially  designed,  the  "oral  test"  should 
be  treated  simply  as  a  personality  test. 

In  the  case  of  the  presidential  postmasters,  where  the  posi- 
tion pays  $2,400  or  over  per  annum,  there  is  specifically  applied 
a  test  of  personality,  but  it  is  not  an  oral  test.  The  regulations 
provide,  as  already  stated,  that  there  shall  be  made  "a  careful 
personal  investigation  of  each  applicant  by  representatives  of 
the  Civil  Servdce  Commission,  one  of  whom  is  to  be  selected 
by  the  Commission  from  the  Post  Office  Department."  It  is 
stated  that  the  investigation  should  cover  two  purposes,  one  of 
them  being  to  make  a  report  on  the  business  training  and  ex- 
perience of  the  candidate  on  the  basis  of  which  his  rating  will 
be  made,  as  already  set  forth.  The  other  purpose  is  "full 
inquiry  as  to  each  candidate's  suitability  for  the  office  by  reasorf 
of  his  character  and  personal  characteristics,  this  part  of  the 
inquiry  to  be  non-competitive  and  not  considered  in  the  rating 
of  the  candidate,  but  if  he  is  found  unsuitable  by  the  Commis- 
sion as  a  result  of  such  inquiry  he,  of  course,  will  not  be  elig- 
ible." ^  This  inquiry,  it  will  be  noted,  covers  "character"  as 
well  as  personal  characteristics ;  but  with  respect  to  the  latter  it 
furnishes  a  unique  instance  of  an  attempt  to  appraise  the  per- 
sonal characteristics  of  an  individual  merely  on  the  basis  of  an 
investigation  not  involving  an  interview  with  the  person  him- 
self. No  information  is  available  as  to  the  proportion  of  cases 
in  which  persons  have  been  debarred  from  the  examination  as 
a  result  of  investigations  of  this  type. 

*  Information  regarding  postmaster  positions  filled  through  nomina- 
tion by  the  President  for  confirmation  by  the  Senate,  United  States  Civil 
Service  Commission,  Form  2223,  July,  1919,  p.  3. 


CHAPTER  XI 

RECRUITMENT  METHODS:   THE   CLASSIFIED   COMPETITIVE 

SERVICE 

The  open  competitive  system  by  which  the  great  mass  of 
the  permanent  personnel  of  the  service  is  recruited  warrants 
a  close  and  detailed  examination,  not  merely  because  of  its  im- 
portance, but  because,  by  the  measure  of  its  success  or  failure 
must  in  large  measure  be  determined  the  question  of  the  de- 
sirability of  extending  the  competitive  system  to  those  positions 
and  branches  of  the  service  where  it  does  not  obtain.  More- 
over, due  to  the  fact  that  this  system  is  so  extensive  and  so 
long  established,  there  have  been  encountered  in  its  develop- 
ment essentially  all  the  problems  which  a  system  of  this  kind 
may  be  called  upon  to  face,  and  the  solutions  which  have  been 
reached  are,  therefore,  of  special  value  because  they  reveal 
the  limitations  and  possibilities  of  the  competitive  method  of 
recruitment  at  particular  points. 

At  the  outset  it  should  be  said  that,  while  the  system  in 
question  is  often  referred  to  as  that  of  open  competitive  ex- 
amination, that  term  is  a  misnomer  in  that  it  conveys  the  im- 
pression that  the  central  feature  of  the  system  is  a  formal 
examination,  involving  the  assembling  of  the  competitors  in 
one  place  and  the  setting  of  a  series  of  standardized  tests  com- 
prising usually  a  set  of  written  questions  to  which  written 
answers  can  be  made.  For  not  a  few  positions  of  the  lower 
grades  the  system  of  recruitment  does  indeed  have  this  char- 
acter. But,  as  will  presently  appear,  the  larger  number  of 
classes  of  positions  ^  are  filled  by  methods  in  which  the  for- 

^  What  is  referred  to  in  this  statement  is  the  number  of  distinct  titles 
not  of  vacancies.  In  most  of  the  positions  for  which  the  traditional  form 
of  written  examination  is  set,  vacancies  and  appointments  are  numerous, 
so  that,  doubtless,  a  great  majority  of  the  appointments  are  made  as 
the  result  of  such  examinations. 

378 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  379 

mal  written  examination  is  entirely  absent.  It  has  come  to  be 
the  practice,  however,  to  term  every  invitation  of  applica- 
tions, even  where  there  is  to  be  merely  a  scrutiny  by  the  Com- 
mission of  the  candidate's  experience,  an  "examination." 
Hence,  the  system  as  a  whole  is  commonly  termed  one  of  open 
competitive  examination,  though  open  competitive  recruitment 
would  be  a  much  more  suitable  term.  In  a  measure  it  is  un- 
fortunate that  the  term  "examination"  has  been  given  this 
extended  signification,  as  it  doubtless  serves  to  obscure  in  the 
minds  of  many  the  varied  and  flexible  character  of  the  methods 
of  recruitment  actually  employed  in  filling  positions  in  the 
federal  service. 

Legal  Basis. — The  basic  provisions  of  the  civil  service 
act  upon  which  the  system  rests  should,  perhaps,  be  first  re- 
viewed. Minor  additions  to  these  provisions  have  been  made 
by  statute  from  time  to  time,  but  may  best  be  considered  in 
connection  with  the  particular  phases  of  the  recruitment  sys- 
tem to  which  they  apply. 

The  civil  service  act  itself  lays  down  no  mandatory  pro- 
visions regarding  methods  of  recruitment,  such  prescription 
being  left  wholly  in  the  hands  of  the  President.  It  provides, 
however,  that  the  rules  to  be  promulgated  by  the  President 
shall  provide  and  declare,  as  nearly  as  the  conditions  of  good 
administration  will  warrant,  as  follows : 

First,  for  open,  competitive  examinations  for  testing  the 
fitness  of  applicants  for  the  public  service  now  classified  or  to 
be  classified  hereunder.  Such  examinations  shall  be  practical 
in  their  character,  and  so  far  as  may  be  shall  relate  to  those 
matters  which  will  fairly  test  the  relative  capacity  and  fitness 
of  the  persons  examined  to  discharge  the  duties  of  the  service 
into  which  they  seek  to  be  appointed. 

Second,  that  all  the  offices,  places,  and  employments  so 
arranged  or  to  be  arranged  in  classes  shall  be  filled  by  selec- 
tions according  to  grade  from  among  those  graded  highest  as 
the  results  of  such  competitive  examinations. 

Third,  appointments  to  the  public  service  aforesaid  in  the 
departments  at  Washington  shall  be  apportioned  among  the 
several  States  and  Territories  and  the  District  of  Columbia 


38o  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

upon  the  basis  of  population  as  ascertained  at  the  last  pre- 
ceding census.  .  .  .^ 

Fourth,  that  there  shall  be  a  period  of  probation  before  any 
absolute  appointment  or  employment  aforesaid. - 

The  rule  requiring  open  competitive  examinations,  it  will 
be  noted,  is  to  be  applied  only  to  "the  public  service  now  classi- 
fied or  to  be  classified  hereunder"  and  that  even  as  to  that  por- 
tion of  the  public  service  it  is  to  be  applied  only  "as  nearly 
as  the  conditions  of  good  administration  will  warrant."  The 
precise  efifect  which  has  been  given  to  these  limitations  in  prac- 
tice was  explained  in  a  preceding  chapter  and  need  not  be  re- 
peated here. 

The  provisions  of  the  act  providing  for  the  appointment 
of  a  Civil  Service  Commission,  and  the  duties  to  be  performed 
by  that  body,  have  also  been  set  forth  in  a  former  chapter. 
With  reference  specifically  to  the  administration  of  the  sys- 
tem of  open  competitive  examinations  required  by  the  pro- 
vision just  cited,  it  is  provided  that  "said  commission  shall, 
subject  to  the  rules  that  may  be  made  by  the  President,  make 
regulations  for,  and  have  control  of,  such  examinations,  and, 
through  its  members  or  the  examiners,  it  shall  supervise  and 
preserve  the  records  of  the  same."  The  act  authorizes  the 
commission  "to  employ  a  chief  examiner,  a  part  of  whose  duty 
it  shall  be,  under  its  direction,  to  act  with  the  examining  boards, 
so  far  as  practicable,  whether  at  Washington  or  elsewhere, 
and  to  secure  accuracy,  uniformity,  and  justice  in  all  their 
proceedings,  which  shall  be  at  all  times  open  to  him." 
Area  of  Competition. — The  civil  service  act  makes  no  pro- 
vision regarding  the  geographical  area  to  the  residents  of  which 
admission  to  competition  for  any  given  post  must  be  granted. 
It  requires,  however,  that  the  rules  promulgated  by  the  Presi- 

*  The  remainder  of  this  clause  provides  that  every  application  for 
an  examination  shall  contain,  among-  other  things,  a  statement,  under 
oath,  setting  forth  iiis  or  her  actual  boua  fide  residence  at  the  time  of 
making  the  application,  as  well  as  how  long  he  or  she  has  been  resident 
of  such  place. 

*  There  are  four  additional  provisions  numbered  fifth,  sixth,  seventh, 
and  eighth  which  this  section  requires  to  be  incorporated  in  the  rules, 
but  they  have  no  reference  to  the  competitive  examination  system. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  381 

dent  shall  provide  that  "appointments  to  the  service  aforesaid 
[that  is,  the  classified  service]  in  the  departments  at  Wash- 
ington shall  be  apportioned  among  the  several  states  and  terri- 
tories and  the  District  of  Columbia  upon  the  basis  of  popula- 
tion," and  this  provision  clearly  implies  that  competition  for 
posts  in  the  departments  at  Washington  shall  be  open  to  resi- 
dents of  every  section  of  the  country.  With  respect  to  the  posi- 
tions in  the  field  services  there  is  no  provision  of  the  act  v^hich 
would  seem  to  have  any  bearing;  so  that  the  power  of  the 
President  to  limit  competition  for  any  particular  position  in 
the  field  service  of  any  area  that  he  may  deem  proper  would 
seem  to  be  clear. 

The  rules  do  not  make  any  express  provision,  however,  for 
the  imposition  of  residence  requirements  upon  candidates, 
either  directly  or  by  conferring  authority  upon  the  Commission 
to  fix  such  requirements.  Nevertheless,  the  Commission,  in 
two  cases,  has  taken  it  upon  itself  to  fix  a  requirement  of  this 
kind;  and,  doubtless,  should  the  question  ever  come  to  issue, 
its  power  would  be  upheld  as  being  merely  incidental  to  the 
general  power  of  fixing  requirements  for  admission  to  examina- 
tion. The  cases  referred  to  are  those  of  rural  carrier  and 
fourth  class  postmaster.  As  to  the  former,  it  is  provided  in 
regulations  promulgated  by  the  Commission  and  the  Post- 
master General  jointly  that  "the  Commission  may  refuse  to 
examine  an  applicant  .  .  .  who  is  not  actually  domiciled  within 
the  territory  supplied  by  a  post  office  situated  in  the  county 
for  which  the  examination  is  held."  ^  It  should  be  noted  that 
this  requirement  does  not  in  terms  impose  a  residence  require- 
ment but  merely  provides  that  the  Commission  "may  refuse 
to  examine"  an  applicant  who  does  not  meet  the  requirement. 
In  practice,  however,  the  requirement  is  invariably  imposed. 

The  requirement  in  the  case  of  fourth  class  postmasters  is 
expressed  even  more  tentatively,  the  statement  being  that  "the 

*  Regulations  Governing  the  Manner  of  Appointment  to  the  Position 
of  Carrier  in  the  Rural  Delivery  Service,  United  States  Civil  Service 
Commission,  Form  1494,  February,  1912.  This  provision  is  further  ex- 
plained thus :  "The  county  for  which  a  person  may  be  examined  is  the 
county  in  which  the  post  office  that  supplies  his  home  is  situated." 


382  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Commission  is  authorized  to  exclude  from  examination  a  per- 
son .  .  .  who  does  not  actually  reside  within  the  territory 
supplied  by  the  office  from  which  examination  is  made."  ^ 
Here  too  the  requirement  is  uniformly  applied. 

While  these  are  the  only  cases  of  residence  requirement  as 
a  prerequisite  to  entrance  to  the  examination  that  have  come 
to  notice,  the  rules  make  provision  for  the  restriction  of  certifi- 
cation for  field  positions  to  residents  of  particular  districts. 
The  rules  provide  (Rule  VH,  3)  that  "the  Commission  may 
arrange  the  territory  of  the  United  States  into  appropriate 
districts  for  the  purpose  of  certification  to  positions  in  parts  of 
the  service  not  subject  to  apportionment;-  and  certification 
to  any  such  position  may  be  confined  to  residents  of  the  dis- 
trict in  which  such  position  is  located," 

Curiously  enough,  the  Commission  has  never  exercised  the 
precise  authority  thus  conferred  on  it  by  the  rules;  that  is,  it 
has  never  restricted  certification  to  the  residents  of  any  par- 
ticular district,  but  has  instead  restricted  it  to  persons  who  may 
have  been  examined  in  a  given  district.  The  distinction  is,  of 
course,  not  very  material,  though  in  view  of  the  interval  which 
frequently  elapses  between  the  time  of  the  examination  and 
the  time  of  certification  the  method  contemplated  by  the  rule 
would  seem  the  more  logical  one.^ 

To  review  the  various  regulations  as  to  the  districting  of  the 
country  for  purposes  of  certification  for  field  positions  and 
the  restriction  of  certification  to  those  examined  in  such  dis- 
tricts would  be  of  no  value.    The  several  variations  are  with- 

'  Instructions  to  Applicants  for  the  Fourth  Class  Postmaster  Exam- 
ination, United  States  Civil  Service  Commission,  Form  1759,  June,  1Q19, 
section  7. 

"As  will  appear  subsequently,  there  are  certain  positions  in  the 
departmental  service  at  Washington  to  which  the  rule  of  apportionment 
is  not  applied.  Whether  these  positions  would  be  regarded  as  "not  sub- 
ject to  apportionment"  within  the  meaning  of  this  rule  has  never  come 
up  for  decision,  as  the  Commission  lias  never  attempted  to  apply  the 
provisions  of  this  rule  to  such  positions.  Presumably,  however,  the  in- 
tent is  to  apply  the  rule  only  to  field  positions. 

'  It  should  be  noted  that  as  to  field  positions  there  is  no  provision 
requiring  a  person  to  be  examined  at  or  within  any  area  related  to  the 
place  of  his  residence,  the  provisions  of  the  act  of  1909  requiring  an 
actual  domicile  of  one  year  previous  to  the  examination  in  the  state  in 
which  examination  is  held  having  application  only  to  apportioned  positions. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  383 

out  fundamental  significance  and  are  based  upon  the  experi- 
ence of  the  Commission  in  each  case.  For  the  purpose  of  ref- 
erence they  are  given  below. ^ 

'  Indian  Service. — For  filling  a  vacancy  in  the  Indian  Service  (except 
in  clerical  positions)  certification  is  made  of  the  highest  three  eligibles 
on  the  proper  register  who  indicate  a  willingness  to  accept  appointment 
in  the  State  where  the  vacancy  exists.  Competitors  are  given  opportu- 
nity at  the  time  of  their  examination  to  state  the  locality  in  which  they 
are  willing  to  accept  employment.  They  may  mention  the  states  in  which 
they  wish  to  be  employed  or  state  that  they  are  willing  to  accept  em- 
ployment anywhere  in  the  United  States. 

Lay  Inspector  in  the  Bureau  of  Animal  Industry. — This  method  is 
also  followed  in  making  certifications  for  the  position  of  lay  inspector 
in  the  Bureau  of  Animal  Industry  of  the  Department  of  Agriculture. 

Chinese  and  Immigrant  Inspector. — For  purposes  of  certification  of 
eligibles  for  appointment  to  the  positions  of  Chinese  and  immigrant  in- 
spector, the  United  States  is  divided  into  four  districts,  the  Mississipj)i 
River  being  the  dividing  line  north  and  south  and  the  northern  boundaries 
of  North  Carolina,  Tennessee,  Arkansas,  Oklahoma,  New  Mexico,  Ari- 
zona,  Nevada,  and  California  the  dividing  line  east  and  west. 

Positions  in  the  Canal  Zone. — As  a  result  of  examinations  for  posi- 
tions in  the  Canal  Zone  two  lists  of  eligibles  will  be  established,  one 
containing  the  names  of  persons  examined  in  the  Canal  Zone,  and  the 
other  containing  the  names  of  those  examined  at  other  places.  Those 
examined  in  the  Canal  Zone  will  be  preferred  for  appointments  in  the 
Panama  Canal  Service  in  the  Canal  Zone. 

Customs  Service. — For  the  Customs  Service  certification  will  be  made 
of  eligibles  examined  in  the  customs  district  in  which  the  vacancy  ex- 
ists, except  that  when  a  customs  district  extends  over  parts  of  two  or 
more  civil  service  districts  certification  will  be  made  of  eligibles  exam- 
ined in  that  part  of  the  customs  district  which  is  in  the  civil  service 
district  in  which  the  vacancy  exists. 

Internal  Revenue  Service. — For  the  Internal  Revenue  Service  cer- 
tification will  be  made  of  those  examined  in  the  internal  revenue  dis- 
trict in  which  the  vacancy  exists.  This  does  not  apply  to  the  Tenth 
Civil  Service  district,  where  vacancies  will  be  filled  by  the  certificatioji 
of  persons  examined  in  the  city  in  which,  or  in  the  vicinity  of  which,  the 
vacancy  exists. 

Raihvay  Mail  Clerk. — The  railway  mail  clerk  register  is  kept  by  states, 
according  to  the  legal  residence  of  the  eligibles,  and  when  a  vacancy 
occurs  requisition  is  made  for  certification  from  the  register  of  the 
state  in  which  the  vacancy  exists.  If  there  is  no  register  in  the  state  in 
which  the  vacancy  exists,  certification  is  made  from  an  adjoining  sta.te 
having  available  eligibles. 

An  eligible  on  the  railway  mail  clerk  register  is  allowed  to  have  his 
eligibility  transferred  from  the  register  of  one  state  to  that  of  another 
only  when  he  can  show  that  he  has  been  a  bona  Me  resident  of  the  state 
to  which  transfer  of  eligibility  is  desired  for  a  period  of  at  least  six 
months  next  preceding  the   date  of   the  request. 

Clerk,  and  Carrier  for  City  Delivery,  in  Post  Offices. — For  the  posi- 
tions of  clerk,  and  carrier  for  city  delivery,  in  post  offices,  a  separate 
register  is  established  for  each  classified  post  office,  containing  the  names 
of  eligibles  examined  for  such  office.  For  certain  large  post  offices  sepa- 
rate mail  clerk  and  carrier  registers  are  established,  while  for  all  other 
offices  in  which  both  clerks  and  city  carriers  are  employed  the  names  of 
male  eligibles  are  entered  on  both  the  clerk  and  carrier  registers.  Copies 
of   registers   established    for   a   post   office   are   furnished   the   postmaster, 


384  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Needless  to  say  where,  owing  to  the  small  number  of 
eligibles  examined  in  one  district,  it  is  found  impracticable  to 

and  he  makes  selection  to  fill  a  vacancy  from  the  highest  three  names 
on  the  appropriate  register. 

Rural  Carrier.- — In  filling  a  vacancy  in  the  position  of  rural  carrier 
there  will  be  certified  the  name  of  the  person  standing  highest  on  the 
register  who  has  his  actual  domicile  in  the  territory  supplied  by  the  post 
office  at  which  the  vacancy  exists,  together  with  the  names  of  the  t\yo 
eligibles  standing  highest  on  the  register  for  the  entire  county,  who  have 
not  expressed  unwillingness  to  accept  appointment  at  such  post  office. 
After  due  opportunity  to  become  eligible  has  been  given  to  persons  hav- 
ing their  domicile  in  the  territory  of  such  office  and  such  persons  fail 
to  become  eligible,  the  three  eligibles  standing  highest  on  the  county 
register  who  have  not  expressed  unwillingness  to  accept  appointment  at 
such  office  will  be  certified. 

Fourth  Class  Postmaster. — In  filling  a  vacancy  in  the  position  of 
fourth  class  postmaster  tliere  will  be  certified  the  names  of  three  eligibles, 
if  there  be  that  many,  standing  at  the  head  of  the  register.  Certification 
will  be  made  without  regard  to  sex,  unless  specified  in  the  request  for 
certification.  Where  more  than  one  member  of  a  family  is  examined 
for  fourth  class  postmaster,  only  the  name  of  the  member  receiving  the 
highest  eligible  rating  will  be  entered  upon  the  eligible  register.  Should 
this  person  withdraw  his  eligibility,  the  name  of  the  member  of  the  fam- 
ily who  received  the  next  highest  rating  may,  upon  his  request,  be  en- 
tered upon   the   register. 

Forest  Clerk  in  the  Forest  Service  and  Field  Clerk  in  the  Reclattui- 
tion  Service. — In  filling  vacancies  in  the  positions  of  forest  clerk  in  the 
Forest  Service  and  field  clerk  in  the  Reclamation  Service  preference  will 
be  given  to  persons  examined  in  the  locality  in  which  the  vacancy  exists. 
In  case  the  register  for  any  locality  becomes  exhausted,  resort  may  be 
had  to  the  register  for  the  nearest  locality  that  contains  the  names  of 
eligibles  available  for  the  position  vacant. 

Stenographer,  Typczeriter,  and  Stenographer  and  Typezmter. — In 
making  certification  for  filling  vacancies  in  the  positions  of  stenographer, 
typewriter,  and  stenographer  and  typewriter  occurring  in  field  services, 
the  regulations  outlined  in  the  foregoing  paragraplis  relative  to  methods 
of  certification  for  various  branches  of  the  service  will  apply  so  far  as 
possible.  In  case  the  register  for  any  locality  becomes  exhausted,  resort 
may  be  had  to  the  register  for  the  nearest  locality  that  contains  the  names 
of  eligibles  available  for  the  position  vacant.  Each  competitor  will  be 
given  an  opportunity  at  the  time  of  his  examination  to  indicate  the  locali- 
ties in   which  he  is   willing   to  accept   appointment. 

Certifications  for  filling  vacancies  in  the  positions  of  stenographer, 
typewriter,  and  stenographer  and  typewriter  in  offices  of  chiefs  of  field 
divisions  of  the  Land  Office  Service  will  be  made  of  eligibles  examined 
at  the  place  at  which,  or  in  tiie  immediate  vicinity  of  which,  the  vacancy 
exists;  and  in  the  absence  of  such  local  eligibles  certification  will  be 
made  of  eligibles  examined  in  the  state  in  which  the  vacancy  exists,.  _ 

Clerk  in  the  Army  Transport  Service. — Certification  for  filling  va- 
cancies in  the  position  of  clerk  in  the  Army  Transport  Service  will  be 
made  of  eligibles  examined  in  tlie  city,  or  the  vicinity  of  the  city,  from 
which   the   transport  sails. 

Other  F.ducational  Positions. — In  filling  vacancies  in  any  position 
filled  by  educational  examination  not  specifically  provided  for  above, 
certification  will  be  made  of  eligibles  examined  at  the  place  at  which,  or 
in  the  immediate  vicinity  of  which,  the  vacancy  exists,  except  in  the 
absence  of  local  eligibles  after  due  opportunity  of  local  competition  has 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  385 

confine  certification  to  that  district,  resort  may  be  had  to  a 
larger  area  or  even  to  the  whole  country. 

Examining  and  Recruiting  Organization. — '  Under  the  Chief 
Examiner  at  Washington  is  a  force  of  examiners  and  examin- 
ing clerks.  In  addition  to  its  own  staff  of  examiners  the  Com- 
mission makes  use  to  some  extent  of  the  personnel  of  the  vari- 
ous departments  for  the  preparation  of  questions  and  the  rating 
of  examinations,  particularly  in  connection  with  the  more  tech- 
nical and  scientific  subjects.  Occasional  use  is  also  made  of 
experts  not  in  the  government  service  for  special  examining 
work.  In  addition  to  this  central  force  the  commission  main- 
tains at  twelve  principal  cities  district  offices  in  charge  of  dis- 
trict secretaries.  The  function  of  these  officers  is  to  serve  as 
centers  for  publicity,  for  the  conduct  and  supervision  of  ex- 
aminations and  for  the  maintenance  of  eligible  lists  for  the 
districts  within  their  jurisdiction.  The  only  examining  work, 
that  is,  actual  rating  of  candidates  done  in  or  from  these  dis- 

been  afforded,  when  certification  may  be  made  from  registers  for  the 
nearest  locaHty  containing  the  names  of  available  eligibles. 

When  certification  for  filling  vacancies  in  a  certain  position  or  class 
of  positions  ordinarily  is  restricted  to  eligibles  examined  within  a  certain 
prescribed  territory,  and  it  is  found  to  be  impracticable  to  obtain  suf- 
ficient eligibles  from  examinations  held  in  such  territory,  then,  when  the 
territory  in  which  the  examination  is  held  is  extended  by  special  an- 
nouncement of  an  examination  in  an  effort  to  obtain  additional  eligibles, 
the  territory  from  which  certification  will  be  made  is  likewise  extended 
for  the  vacancy  or  vacancies  covered  by  the  announcement,  unless  the 
announcement  specified  otherwise. 

Non-educational  Positions. — In  filling  vacancies  in  non-educational 
positions  for  which  applications  are  filed  with  the  district  secretary, 
certification  will  be  made  of  eligibles  readily  available  for  employment — 
that  is,  of  those  who  live  in  the  place  or  in  the  vicinity  of  the  place  of 
employment  and  of  those  who  do  not  live  in  the  place  or  vicinity  but 
who  have  presented  themselves  to  a  member  of  the  local  board  of  civil 
service  examiners  (or  to  the  employing  officer,  when  there  is  no  local 
board  member)  at  the  place  at  which  employment  is  desired.  An  eligible 
who  does  not  live  in  the  place  where  he  desires  employment  will  not 
be  certified  for  appointment  there  until  he  has  personally  appeared  be- 
fore a  member  of  the  local  board  of  examiners  (or  the  employing  of- 
ficer) at  that  place,  has  secured  a  certificate  from  the  board  member 
(or  the  employing  officer)  showing  the  date  on  which  he  appeared,  and 
has  filed  such  certificate  with  the  district  secretary.  In  this  connection 
vicinity  is  defined  as  the  territory  within  the  usual  commuting  distance. 
An  employing  officer  is  the  official  in  charge  of  an  office  or  other  es- 
tablishment. 

In  filling  vacancies  in  non-educational  positions  for  which  appli- 
cations are  filed  with  local  boards,  certification  will  be  made  in  accord- 
ance with  the  special  regulations  governing. 


386  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

trict  offices  is  in  connection  with  examinations  for  skilled  trades 
positions. 

At  each  town  of  any  importance  within  each  district,  more- 
over, is  a  so-called  local  civil  service  board  consisting  of  three 
persons  employed  in  one  or  another  of  the  field  services  of 
the  government.  These  boards  are  specifically  created  by  the 
civil  service  act  which  provides  that  "the  commission  shall,  at 
Washington,  and  in  one  or  more  places  in  each  State  and  Ter- 
ritory where  examinations  are  to  take  place,  designate  and  select 
a  suitable  number  of  persons,  not  less  than  three,  in  the  official 
service  of  the  United  States,  residing  in  said  State  or  Terri- 
tory, after  consulting  the  head  of  the  department  or  office  in 
which  such  persons  serve,  to  be  members  of  boards  of  ex- 
aminers, and  may  at  any  time  substitute  any  other  person  in 
said  service  living  in  such  State  or  Territory  in  the  place  of 
any  one  so  selected.  Such  boards  of  examiners  shall  be  so 
located  as  to  make  it  reasonably  convenient  and  inexpensive 
for  applicants  to  attend  before  them."  At  the  present  time 
there  exist  some  2,000  of  these  boards.  Their  function  is  to 
give  information  regarding  examinations,  and  to  conduct  writ- 
ten examinations  for  the  positions  for  which  there  are  numerous 
competitors. 

Places  of  Holding  Examinations. — 'The  number  and  dis- 
tribution of  the  places  in  which  the  examination  is  held  is  an 
important  factor  affecting  the  extent  of  the  competition  secured 
for  a  given  position.  As  stated  in  the  preceding  chapter,  for 
a  number  of  positions,  the  Commission  does  not  require  the 
competitors  to  assemble  in  any  one  place ;  but  it  does  for  the 
great  clerical  examination  and  those  for  technical  positions  to 
which  appointments  are  made  in  considerable  numbers.  In 
these  examinations,  the  great  area  of  the  country  presents  to 
the  Commission  an  examination  problem  far  more  difficult 
than  that  found  in  any  other  jurisdiction  in  the  world  where 
a  system  of  competitive  examination  for  the  public  service  is 
in  force.  The  Commission,  from  the  beginning,  has  grappled 
boldly  with  the  problem,  and  has  developed  a  system  under 
which  the  examinations  for  the  more  popular  positions  are 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  387 

fully  as  accessible  to  every  citizen,  so  far  as  the  place  of  holding 
is  concerned,  as  they  could  reasonably  be  expected  to  be,  and 
probably  more  so.  There  are  now  443  cities  in  which  the 
Commission  has  rooms  permanently  assigned  for  examina- 
tion purposes. 

The  examinations  for  the  ordinary  clerical  positions  are 
held  at  hundreds  and  sometimes  even  thousands  of  points.  In 
the  examination  for  census  clerk  held  in  191 9  to  fill  several 
thousand  vacancies  in  Washington,  applications  were  invited 
for  examination  at  any  of  2,150  points.  For  the  scientific  or 
other  specialized  positions  in  which  vacancies  are  few  and 
infrequent,  examinations  are  held  only  at  the  more  important 
centers. 

Ordering  of  Examinations. — The  ordering  of  examina- 
tions is  done  largely  upon  the  specific  requests  of  departments; 
though,  in  a  number  of  positions,  the  demand  is  so  regular  and 
unremitting  that  examinations  are  held  periodically  almost  as 
a  matter  of  course.  In  connection  with  the  ordering  of  exami- 
nations, the  commission  has  been  prone  in  the  past  to  allow 
the  appointing  officers  or  the  department  concerned  to  have  a 
large,  if  not  determining,  voice  in  deciding  whether  a  special 
examination  shall  be  held  for  a  particular  position  open  in  the 
department,  or  whether  the  positions  shall  be  filled  by  certifi- 
cations from  lists  obtained  by  other  examinations  of  a  similar 
or  more  general  kind.  Where  much  heed  is  given  to  the 
views  of  departments  in  this  respect,  it  is  the  universal  experi- 
ence that  each  department  tends  to  overemphasize  greatly  the 
peculiarity  of  the  qualifications  required  for  its  own  work  and 
to  favor  special  examinations  when,  from  any  outside  view- 
point, candidates  obtained  as  the  result  of  examinations  of  a 
more  general  kind  would  be  amply  satisfactory.  This  result 
has  unquestionably  ensued  in  the  federal  service  and  persists 
to-day,  although  in  lessened  degree.  The  Commission  would 
do  well  to  adopt  a  more  independent  position  in  this  matter 
than  it  has  heretofore,  and  to  insist  on  its  own  right  and  ability 
to  decide  at  least  in  the  case  of  the  run  of  subordinate  positions 
the  propriety  of  filling  such  positions  from  any  given  list. 


388  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

A  factor  which  has  greatly  increased  the  difficulty  under 
which  the  Commission  has  labored  in  unifying  its  examina- 
tions has  been  the  absence  of  standard  titles  and  work  specifi- 
cations for  the  several  positions.  A  mere  dissimilarity  of 
titles  as  between  different  departments  has  given  the  appear- 
ance of  dissimilarity  in  duties  when  no  real  dissimilarity  was 
present.  This  is  a  point  at  which  the  need  for  standard  classi- 
fications of  types  of  service  common  to  two  or  more  depart- 
ments, and  the  advantages  to  be  realized  by  such  standardiza- 
tion, are  very  great,  though  not  commonly  appreciated  by 
those  not  in  intimate  contact  with  the  workings  of  a  large 
public  personnel  system. 

In  connection  with  the  problem  of  unifying  examinations 
the  following  statement,  made  in  1909  by  the  Chief  Examiner 
of  the  Commission,  is  of  interest : 

Particular  attention  is  invited  to  the  progress  that  has 
been  made  in  carrying  out  the  Commission's  policy  of  con- 
solidation, or  unification,  of  examinations  and  resultant  com- 
bination of  eligible  registers.  Additions  to  the  classified  serv- 
ice have  usually  taken  the  form  of  executive  orders  directing 
the  classification  of  one  or  more  entire  branches  of  the  service 
at  a  time.  In  applying  the  examination  system  to  the  dif- 
ferent services  as  they  were  classified  it  was  found  that  ap- 
pointing officers  held  various  views  as  to  what  constituted  suit- 
able examinations  or  tests.  The  result  has  been  a  variety  of 
dififerent  examinations  for  practically  similar  positions  in  dif- 
ferent parts  of  the  service.  For  example,  the  examination  for 
elevator  conductor  in  the  departments  at  Washington  and  in 
some  offices  in  the  field  consisted  of  a  simple  mental  test  com- 
bined with  a  rating  on  experience,  while  the  examination  for 
the  same  position  in  the  custodian  service  contained  no  mental 
test.  Again,  in  some  branches  of  the  service  the  examination 
for  watchman  consisted  of  simple  mental  tests,  physical  con- 
dition, and  experience,  while  for  other  parts  of  the  service  no 
mental  test  was  given.  It  was  found  that  three  different  kinds 
of  examinations  were  given  for  the  position  of  messenger  in 
various  parts  of  the  service.  Likewise,  there  grew  up  a  num- 
ber of  examinations  for  general  clerical  positions,  which, 
though  similar  in  degree  of  difficulty,  contained  different  forms 
of  tests, 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  389 

It  is  highly  desirable,  economically  and  otherwise,  that  the 
examinations  for  a  given  kind  of  position  common  to  more 
than  one  branch  of  the  service  be  identical  in  scope  and  char- 
acter wherever  such  positions  may  occur  in  any  part  of  the 
classified  service.  Accordingly,  the  Commission  has  asked  and 
obtained  the  assent  of  departments  concerned  to  the  unification 
of  examinations  for  several  positions,  as  follows :  Messenger, 
watchman,  skilled  laborer,  elevator  conductor,  trained  nurse, 
physician,  and  general  clerical  positions.  It  is  hoped  still  fur- 
ther to  unify  and  consolidate  the  examinations  and  thus  to 
simplify  in  many  ways  the  work  of  the  Commission  in  holding 
examinations,  rating  papers,  and  certifying  eligibles,  as  well  as 
to  make  available  for  the  service  the  best  material  in  the  way 
of  applicants,  that  has  been  divided  among  different  registers 
of  eligibles. 

The  application  of  this  policy  will  tend  to  eliminate  com- 
plications in  the  matter  of  assignments  of  employees  and  to 
give  greater  elasticity  and  availability  to  the  force  in  any  par- 
ticular establishment  or  part  of  the  service.  Particularly,  it 
is  believed  that  great  benefit  will  result  in  the  filling  of  vacan- 
cies in  the  various  field  services,  for  it  will  be  possible  to  have 
the  eligible  registers  for  these  services  kept  in  the  offices  of 
the  Commission's  district  secretaries  throughout  the  country; 
examinations  to  be  held  locally  and  registers  maintained  sepa- 
rately for  each  particular  place  and  its  immediate  vicinity, 
where  there  may  be  federal  establishments;  and  the  matter  of 
certification  and  selection  for  appointment  will  then  be  handled 
in  the  first  instance  by  the  local  officials  in  charge  of  the  vari- 
ous services  and  the  Commission's  district  secretaries.  It  is 
believed  that  this  procedure  will  result  not  only  in  economy  of 
time  and  labor  in  promptly  filling  vacancies,  but  will  also  give 
the  local  officials  the  opportunity  to  select  and  recommend  for 
appointment  the  best  fitted  of  those  certified. 

Advertising  and  Inviting  Applications. — When  an  ex- 
amination has  been  ordered,  the  next  step  is  to  advertise  and 
invite  applications.  Ordinarily  use  is  made  of  the  post  offices 
and  other  public  buildings  for  posting  announcements  of  ex- 
aminations, and  a  number  of  educational  and  other  institutions 
regularly  receive  all  announcements  of  the  Commission  and 
bulletin  them.  Incidentally  the  not  inconsiderable  number  of 
correspondence  schools  which  undertake  to  give  instruction,  gr 


390  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

rather  to  coach,  for  the  principal  examinations  at  which  large 
numbers  are  examined,  such  as  clerk,  carrier,  etc.,  furnish  a 
considerable  quantity  of  advertising,  much  of  it,  however, 
more  or  less  unreliable  and  misleading.  Finally,  announce- 
ments are  sent  to  many  newspapers  and  technical  periodicals, 
which  give  publicity  to  such  announcements  in  their  news 
columns. 

In  addition  to  these  general  methods  the  Commission  fur- 
nishes the  announcement  of  any  particular  examination,  as 
ordered,  to  any  one  filing  his  name  with  the  Commission.  The 
difficulty  with  this  method  is  that  the  applicant  must  specify 
the  particular  examination.  Several  years  ago  the  Chief 
Examiner  of  the  Commission  recommended  that  a  method  Ije 
adopted  whereby  application  could  be  made  for  information 
regarding  all  examinations  which  might  be  in  line  with  the 
individual's  qualifications.     He  stated  : 

Many  persons  who  might  be  well  qualified  for  some  po- 
sition in  the  classified  service  are  not  sufficiently  familiar  with 
the  organization  of  the  departments,  the  places  of  employ- 
ment, and  the  qualifications  needed  in  the  different  offices  or 
establishments,  to  enable  them  to  decide  for  which  position 
their  experience,  training,  and  education  best  fit  them  to  com- 
pete. For  example,  because  of  lack  of  knowledge  where  to 
obtain  the  information  or  because  of  failure  to  see  in  a  news- 
paper or  to  observe  elsewhere  the  announcement  of  some  ex- 
amination exactly  fitting  his  qualifications,  a  person  may  apply 
for  an  examination  for  a  position  for  which  he  is  not  fitted, 
whereupon  he  fails  to  pass,  or,  if  he  passes,  his  rating  is  too 
low  to  bring  him  within  reach  of  certification  for  appointment. 
If  he  had  known  of  the  examination  for  the  position  which 
actually  fitted  his  qualifications,  he  would  have  had  an  excellent 
prospect  of  appointment  and  the  government  would  have  been 
in  position  to  avail  itself  of  his  services. 

It  is  suggested  that  the  commission  might  well  supplement 
its  present  means  of  communication  with  intending  applicants 
by  incorporating  in  the  Manual  of  Examinations  a  blank  form 
on  which  an  intending  applicant  may  set  forth  a  statement  of 
his  age,  experience,  and  education,  the  places  where,  and  the 
salary  at  which  he  would  accept  employment,  and  file  it  with 
the  commission.     The  commission  would  then  be  in  position 


RFXRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  391 

to  call  to  his  special  attention  any  examinations  pending  or 
announced  in  future  which  seemed  most  closely  to  fit  his  quali- 
fications. The  qualifications  needed  in  the  public  service  cover 
a  field  so  wide  that,  unless  an  applicant's  demands  as  to  salary 
or  place  of  employment  are  such  as  to  make  it  impossible  for 
him  to  secure  government  employment,  the  commission  would 
be  able  to  advise  him,  when  in  possession  of  data  in  regard  to 
his  experience,  education,  etc.,  of  examinations  for  positions 
for  which  he  would  be  best  fitted  and  which  might  not  other- 
wise come  to  his  attention. 

Such  a  plan  could  not,  however,  be  carried  out  unless  ad- 
ditional employees  were  provided,  but  it  is  believed  that  the 
benefits  to  the  service  which  would  result  would  amply  jus- 
tify the  necessary  additional  expense  for  clerical  assistance. 

No  action  was,  however,  taken  on  this  recommendation. 
In  addition  to  these  regular  methods  of  publicity  the  Com- 
mission quite  frequently,  when  an  examination  is  ordered  for 
which  special  technical  qualifications  are  demanded,  goes  to 
considerable  lengths  to  reach  all  classes  of  persons  who  may 
be  in  a  position  to  bring  the  needs  of  the  government  to  the 
attention  of  qualified  persons. 

As  the  range  of  governmental  activities  has  widened,  nec- 
essarily the  number  and  variety  of  the  commission's  examina- 
tions have  increased,  and  there  has  arisen  need  for  closer  and 
more  definitive  advertising  of  examinations  in  order  to  reach 
the  best  qualified  applicants.  Therefore,  in  addition  to  the 
procedure  ordinarily  followed  in  announcing  examinations,  the 
application  division  has  gradually  built  up,  for  scientific  and 
technical  examinations,  a  series  of  mailing  lists  of  publica- 
tions, universities,  and  colleges,  associations,  clubs,  profes- 
sors, and  technical  experts,  to  whose  attention  are  brought 
any  examinations  in  which  it  is  believed  they  will  be  directly 
interested  or  can  interest  others. 

Illustrative  cases  are : 

Valuation  analyst,  Interstate  Commerce  Commission :  An- 
nouncements for  this  examination  were  sent  to  400  profes- 
sional, technical,  or  railroad  publications,  1,300  chief  account- 
ing officers  of  railroads,  700  members  of  the  American 
Statistical  Association,  700  secretaries  of  trade  organizations, 
and,  through  the  courtesy  of  the  Chamber  of  Commerce  of  the 


392  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

United  States,  a  notice  of  the  examination  was  inserted  in 
its  bulletin,  which  was  distributed  to  700  commercial  organ- 
izations and  3,000  individuals. 

Chief  statistician  for  vital  statistics,  I'ureau  of  the  Census: 
Announcements  were  sent  to  175  medical  journals,  100  health 
officers  of  cities  of  more  than  50,000  inhabitants,  48  State 
health  officers,  500  actuaries  and  statisticians  of  insurance  com- 
panies, 700  members  of  the  American  Statistical  Association, 
50  secretaries  of  American  medical  societies,  and  48  secretaries 
of  State  medical  boards. 

Despite  the  zeal  and  thoroughness  with  which  the  Com- 
mission has  thus  attempted  to  canvass  the  field  in  the  case  of 
positions  of  a  technical  character,  it  is  believed  that  the  use  of 
display  advertising  in  scientific  and  technical  journals,  in  addi- 
tion to  the  news  notes  of  examinations  which  now  appear  in 
those  journals,  would  bring  the  examinations  to  the  attention 
of  a  wider  circle,  embracing  many  men  and  women  whom  pres- 
ent methods  do  not  reach  because  these  people,  to  begin  with, 
do  not  have  any  interest  in  the  federal  service.  It  has  been 
the  experience  of  commissions  elsewhere,  particularly  of  the 
New  York  City  Civil  Service  Commission,  that  display  adver- 
tising in  these  journals  does  reach  this  most  desirable  class 
of  possible  applicants.  The  expense  involved,  moreover,  is, 
because  of  the  low  rates  charged  by  most  of  these  publications, 
relatively  small.  The  federal  commission  has  never  made  use 
of  this  method.  It  never  has  obtained  any  appropriation  for 
the  purpose ;  nor  has  it  ever  made  a  serious  attempt  to  do  so. 
Safeguarding  the  Integrity  of  Examinations. — In  any 
formal  system  of  examination,  safeguards  must  be  provided 
to  insure  the  integrity  of  the  examination;  and  if  the  system  is 
on  a  strictly  competitive  basis  the  need  is,  of  course,  greatly 
increased.  The  most  obvious  need  is  to  prevent  the  questions 
in  written  test,  or  the  "problem"  in  a  manual  or  "practical" 
test,  from  becoming  known  to  any  of  the  competitors  prior  to 
the  test. 

The  procedure  which  has  been  adopted  by  the  Civil  Service 
Commission  to  keep  advance  knowledge  of  the  cjuestions,  not 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  393 

only  from  the  competitor,  but  from  the  local  board,  has  been 
thus  described  by  the  Chief  I^xaminer  of  the  Commission:  ^ 

The  cjuestions  for  assembled  examinations  are  prepared  by 
the  examiners  in  Washington,  the  utmost  care  being  taken  to 
see  that  their  confidential  character  is  preserved  during  the 
course  of  their  preparation  and  printing.  The  original  of  any 
set  of  questions  bears  the  initials  of  the  examiner  or  examiners 
who  prepared  it.  Only  one  copy  is  allowed  to  be  made,  no 
copies  or  notes  of  the  question  being  allowed  to  be  retained 
by  the  examiners  who  prepare  them. 

The  examination  question  room,  where  unused  printed 
questions  are  kept,  is  accessible  only  to  the  clerks  employed 
there  and  to  the  supervising  officers.  The  application  divi- 
sion advises  the  clerk  in  charge  of  the  question  room  of  the 
number  of  applicants  for  whom  papers  must  be  shipped  to  each 
place  of  examination,  and  shipments  are  made  accordingly,  in 
securely  sealed  packages,  to  the  lofal  secretaries  of  the  boards 
of  examiners.  The  seals  are  not  broken  until  the  competitors 
are  assembled,  and  then  only  in  their  presence.  An  invoice 
of  the  papers  shipped  is  inclosed  in  the  package,  and  the  local 
examiners  are  required  to  account  for  each  paper  shipped,  both 
used  and  unused  papers  to  be  returned  under  seal,  by  regis- 
tered mail,  to  the  Commission  immediately  after  the  close  of 
the  examination. 

The  impersonation  of  a  candidate  by  one  who  is  better 
qualified  to  take  the  examination,  or,  subsequent  to  the  exami- 
nation, the  impersonation  of  the  examined  candidate  with  his 
consent  for  the  purpose  of  obtaining  appointment,  are  addi- 
tional possibilities  against  which  precaution  must  be  taken. 
Prior  to  19 14  the  Commission  relied  for  this  purpose  upon  a 
comparison  of  the  "declaration  sheet"  filled  out  by  the  com- 
petitors at  the  time  of  examination  with  one  filled  out  at  the 
time  of  appointment;  and  this  method  was  successful  in  pre- 
venting numerous  attempts  at  impersonation. 

It  is  not  possible,  however,  under  this  plan,  to  detect  at- 
tempts at  impersonation  in  all  cases  at  the  time  the  appointee 
reports  for  duty,  for  the  reason  that  a  considerable  period  of 

*  Thirty-first  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1914),  p.  28. 


394  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

time  may  elapse  between  the  actual  selection  of  the  appointee 
from  a  certificate  issued  hy  the  Commission  and  the  date  he 
reports  for  duty;  consequently  his  examination  papers  are  not 
in  the  possession  of  the  officer  before  whom  the  declaration 
of  appointee  is  made,  but  have  been  returned  to  the  commission 
with  the  report  of  selection,  and  the  actual  identification  can- 
not be  completed  until  the  commission  has  had  an  opportunity 
to  compare  the  declaration  of  appointee  with  the  answers  to 
the  personal  questions  in  the  application  and  the  examination 
papers.  For  the  reasons  stated,  it  has  happened  that  persons 
not  entitled  to  be  appointed  have  been  sworn  in  and  have  ac- 
tually served  for  short  periods  before  their  deceit  or  fraud 
has  been  discovered.  The  departments  have,  of  course, 
promptly  removed  persons  who  have  fraudulently  secured  ap- 
pointment, upon  report  of  the  facts  by  the  commission;  but 
it  has  been  felt  for  some  time  that  a  system  should  be  put  in 
operation  whereby  it  would  be  impossible  for  an  individual  to 
impose  on  the  government  by  securing  employment  by  fraudu- 
lent means,  even  for  a  short  period  of  time  before  discovery 
and  punishment. 

From  the  beginning  of  the  examinations  for  the  Philippine 
and  Panama  Canal  services  each  competitor  has  been  required 
to  present  to  the  examiner  at  the  time  of  examination  a  photo- 
graph of  himself  taken  within  two  years,  as  a  means  of  iden- 
tification. This,  of  course,  is  a  positive  identification  of  the 
competitor,  and  when  the  photograph  is  compared  with  the 
face  of  the  person  who  reports  for  duty,  there  can  be  no  ques- 
tion of  impersonation.  In  the  case  of  appointments  to  these 
services  beyond  the  seas  it  was  absolutely  necessary  that  posi- 
tive identification  should  take  place  before  the  appointees  sailed, 
at  the  expense  of  the  government,  for  their  places  of  em- 
ployment. The  recjuirement  was  later  extended  to  examina- 
tions for  the  Indian  Service  and  for  guard  in  United  States 
penitentiaries. 

The  extension  of  the  use  of  photographs  for  identification 
of  competitors  to  all  examinations  of  the  commission  involved 
a  large  amount  of  additional  work  for  the  commission,  in 
the  handling  of  applications  and  in  the  proper  filing  of  the 
photogra|)hs  with  the  examination  papers.  It  also  involved  a 
slight  additional  expense  to  each  applicant.  Therefore,  al- 
though the  commission  has  for  years  recognized  the  advan- 
tages of  the  use  of  photographs  for  identification,  as  shown 
by  their  use  for  some  services,  the  extension  of  the  plan  to  all 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  395 

examinations  has  l^een  withheld  until  the  present  time.  By 
action  of  May  27,  1914,  the  use  of  photographs  for  identifica- 
tion of  competitors  was  extended  to  all  examinations.^ 

A  final  type  of  precaution  found  necessary  is  that  aimed 
to  conceal  from  the  examiner  the  identity  of  the  candidate 
whose  paper  he  is  rating.  The  procedure  on  this  head  is  thus 
described  by  the  Chief  Examiner  of  the  Commission: 

The  first  paper  given  to  a  competitor  in  an  examination 
is  known  as  the  "declaration  sheet,"  and  this  is  the  only  paper 
of  his  examination  on  which  he  signs  his  name.  The  dec- 
laration sheet  is,  in  other  words,  a  sheet  of  identification.  It 
bears  at  its  top  a  printed  number,  which  is  to  be  used  by  the 
competitor  in  place  of  his  name  on  all  other  sheets  of  his  ex- 
amination. Before  any  of  the  actual  examination  is  given  to 
the  competitor  he  must  fill  out  and  sign  the  declaration  sheet, 
placing  his  examination  number  on  a  sheet  of  general  instruc- 
tions, or  preliminary  sheet,  which  he  retains  until  the  exam- 
ination is  completed.  As  soon  as  all  the  competitors  have  filled 
out  the  declaration  sheets  these  sheets  are  collected,  placed  in 
an  envelope,  and  sealed,  there  to  remain  until  the  papers  of 
all  the  competitors  have  been  rated.  Competitors  are  invited 
to  remain  and  see  the  papers  wrapped  and  sealed  for  return  to 
the  commission. 

When  the  returned  papers  are  received  at  the  commis- 
sion's ofiice,  they  are  sent  direct  to  the  examination  question 
room,  where  they  are  opened  and  the  invoice  checked.  Un- 
used questions  are  returned  to  the  proper  place  and  the  used 
papers  are  arranged  by  subjects,  in  bundles  containing  from 
100  to  300  sheets.  A  bundle  of  papers  on  one  subject  is 
often  composed  of  papers  from  many  different  examination 
places.  After  the  papers  have  been  so  arranged  by  subjects, 
they  are  sent  to  the  examining  division  for  rating.  Each 
examiner  who  rates  examination  papers  specializes  on  cer- 
tain sul)jects.  The  identity  of  any  competitor  on  whose  paper 
he  may  be  working  at  any  time  is  unknown  to  him.  The  rat- 
ing is  done  in  accordance  w^ith  specific  rules  laid  down  by  the 
commission,  and  the  work  of  each  examiner  is  reviewed  by 
another,  not  because  of  any  suspicion  of  favoritism  or  un- 
fairness on  the  part  of  the  first  examiner,  but  in  order  to  se- 
cure accuracy  in  the  rating.     An  examiner  is  not  permitted  to 

^  Report  of  the  Chief  Examiner,  contained  in  the  Thirty-first  Report 
of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission  (i9i4),  p.  27. 


396  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

select  the  papers  of  his  special  subject  for  any  particular  place 
of  examination,  but  his  work  is  assigned  to  him  by  an  issue 
clerk,  who  assigns  it  in  such  manner  as  to  complete  the  whole 
most  expeditiously. 

When  the  papers  of  all  the  subjects  have  been  rated  and 
reviewed  they  are  assembled  and  the  general  average  com- 
puted, after  which  the  envelopes  containing  the  declaration 
sheets  are  opened.  It  will  be  seen  that  in  this  way  the  iden- 
tity of  the  competitor  is  not  disclosed  until  all  the  rating  is 
completed  for  all  of  the  competitors  of  the  same  examination. 

In  this  connection  it  should  be  noted  that  no  precaution 
can  be  taken  by  which  an  examiner  may  be  prevented  from 
recognizing  the  handwriting  of  a  competitor  whose  handwriting 
is  familiar  to  him.  It  is  this  possibility  which  is  especially 
present  where  the  personnel  of  the  several  departments  assist 
in  the  rating,  for  it  frequently  happens  that  some  of  the  com- 
petitors are  drawn  from  the  personnel  of  the  same  department 
as  the  examiners. 

In  rating  experience  it  is  extremely  difficult  to  conceal 
the  identity  of  the  several  candidates  fromi  the  examiner.  In 
the  first  place,  even  if  the  rating  is  based  solely  on  the  candi- 
date's own  statement,  the  well  informed  examiner  in  the 
case  of  important  positions  is  more  than  likely  to  identify  some 
of  the  candidates  merely  from  the  facts  given  by  them  re- 
garding their  experience.  In  no  way  can  this  be  guarded 
against.  In  many  cases,  moreover,  the  Commission  makes 
inquiry  of  persons  referred  to  by  the  candidate  as  qualified 
to  express  opinion  as  to  his  qualifications,  and  it  places  the 
replies  before  the  examiners  as  a  basis  for  rating,  and  conse- 
quently it  is  next  to  impossible,  except  at  a  disproportionately 
great  cost  for  clerical  labor,  to  conceal  the  identity  of  the 
candidates  from  the  examiners. 

At  several  minor  points  in  the  present  practice  of  the  Com- 
mission additional  precaution  might  be  taken  without  any 
considerable  expense.  One  of  these  would  be  to  revise  the 
form  of  application  blank  so  as  to  permit  the  name  of  the 
candidate  to  be  detached  before  the  submission  of  the  blank  to 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  397 

the  rating  examiner,  a  practice  in  vogue  with  most  local  com- 
missions. Again,  there  is  no  reason  why  the  vouchers  sub- 
mitted by  the  candidate  should  be  placed  before  the  rating  ex- 
aminer, inasmuch  as  the  persons  making  such  vouchers  are 
not  required  to  testify  to  the  candidate's  qualifications  but 
merely  to  his  good  character.  The  present  practice  on  this 
point  permits  shrewfl  candidates  desiring  to  impress  the  ex- 
aminers, to  obtain  the  signatures  of  influential  persons  who 
may  in  fact  be  but  slightly  acquainted  with  them,  though  sat- 
isfying the  technical  requirements  of  the  voucher. 

It  may  be  of  value  to  mention  here  the  several  statutes 
which  afford  additional  protection  to  the  integrity  of  the  Com- 
mission's examination  system.  The  civil  service  act  itself 
provides  (Section  5)  that: 

Any  said  commissioner,  examiner,  copyist,  or  messenger, 
or  any  person  in  the  public  service  who  shall  willfully  and 
corruptly,  by  himself  or  in  cooperation  with  one  or  more  other 
persons,  defeat,  deceive,  or  obstruct  any  person  in  respect  of 
his  or  her  right  of  examination  according  to  any  such  rules 
or  regulations,  or  who  shall  willfully,  corruptly,  and  falsely 
mark,  grade,  estimate,  or  report  upon  the  examination  or 
proper  standing  of  any  person  examined  hereunder,  or  aid 
in  so  doing,  or  who  shall  willfully  and  corruptly  make  any 
false  representations  concerning  the  same  or  concerning  the 
person  examined,  or  who  shall  willfully  and  corruptly  fur- 
nish to  any  person  any  special  or  secret  information  for  the 
purpose  of  either  improving  or  injuring  the  prospects  or 
chances  of  any  person  so  examined  or  to  be  examined,  being 
appointed,  employed,  or  promoted,  shall  for  each  such  offense 
be  deemed  guilty  of  a  misdemeanor,  and,  upon  conviction 
thereof,  shall  be  punished  by  a  fine  of  not  less  than  one  hun- 
dred dollars,  nor  more  than  one  thousand  dollars,  or  by  im- 
prisonment not  less  than  ten  days  nor  more  than  one  year,  or 
by  both  such  fine  and  imprisonment. 

It  will  be  noted  that  the  application  of  this  provision  is  re- 
stricted to  persons  in  the  public  service.  In  addition,  under 
various  decisions,  it  has  been  held  that  the  statutes  forbidding: 
perjury  ^  prohibits  willfully  false  answers  by  applicants  and 
'  Criminal    Code,   Section    125. 


398  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

the  statute  prohibiting  forgery  for  the  purpose  of  defrauding 
the  United  States  ^  covers  impersonation,  and  the  forging  of 
vouchers.  In  addition  the  statutes  prohibiting  bribery  -  are 
also,  of  course,  appHcable  to  acts  done  in  connection  with  ex- 
aminations. Perhaps  the  most  sweeping  statutory  protection, 
however,  is  that  found  in  the  provisions  of  the  Criminal  Code 
prohibiting  conspiracy  ^  which  provides  for  the  punishment  of 
either  party  to  a  conspiracy,  where  "two  or  more  persons  con- 
spire either  to  commit  any  ofifense  against  the  United  States 
or  to  defraud  the  United  States  in  any  manner  or  for  any 
purpose  and  one  or  more  of  such  parties  do  any  act  to  effect 
the  object  of  the  conspiracy."  Since  it  has  been  held  that 
any  conduct  by  virtue  of  which  a  person  obtains  or  is  put  in 
the  position  of  obtaining  appointment  contrary  to  the  laws 
and  regulations  constitutes  a  fraud  upon  the  United  States,  it 
would  seem  that  this  statute  covers  virtually  any  improper  act 
and  punishes  not  merely  the  officer  of  the  United  States,  as 
does  the  provision  of  the  civil  service  law,  but  the  candidate. 
The  section,  however,  has  never  been  invoked  except  in  con- 
nection with  the  making  of  a  false  statement.  Moreover,  it 
should  be  noted  that  it  applies  only  where  there  have  been 
two  or  more  parties  involved  in  the  act.  The  act  of  a  single 
competitor  could  not  be  brought  within  this  section,  and  pre- 
sumably, unless  falling  within  the  statutory  prohibitions  against 
perjury,  forgery,  or  bribery,  would  not  be  punishable. 
Examination  of  Fourth  Class  Postmasters  and  Rural 
Carriers. — For  one  class  of  competitive  classified  posi- 
tions, the  system  of  examination  is  necessarily  different  from 
that  used  for  ordinary  positions,  namely  for  fourth  class  post- 
masters. These  postmasters  are  in  charge  of  village  offices  the 
annual  receipts  of  which  for  stamped  paper  are  less  than 
$i.8oo.  In  most  cases  these  positions  are  filled  by  the  appoint- 
ment of  retail  storekeepers  who  conduct  the  postal  business  in 
their  stores. 

^  Criminal  Code,  Section  28. 
'Criminal  Code,  Sections  39  and  112. 
*  Criminal  Code,  Section  37. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  399 

The  regulations  now  in  force  ^  divide  the  fourth  class 
postmasterships  into  two  distinct  groups,  according  to  whether 
the  annual  compensation  is  less  than  $180,  or  $180,  or  more. 
The  positions  in  the  first  group,  now  numbering  about  15,000, 
are  only  nominally  in  the  competitive  service.  They  afford 
little,  if  any,  opportunity  for  competition,  since  an  office  pay- 
ing less  than  $180  is  almost  always  located  in  a  place  so  small 
that  it  contains  not  more  than  one  store  or  other  place  suitable 
for  a  post  office.  The  method  provided  here  by  the  regulations 
is  that  of  appointment  after  report  of  a  post  office  inspector, 
based  on  a  visit  to  the  locality,  such  visit  being  made  after 
public  invitation  of  applications  and  notice  of  the  intended 
visit.  The  inspector's  report  must  also  be  filed  with  the  Com- 
mission. Political  or  religious  considerations  in  selection  or 
appointment  are  prohibited.  It  is  further  provided  that  upon 
sworn  statements  submitted  by  one  or  more  persons,  who  are 
property  taxpayers  and  patrons  of  a  post  office  in  this  class, 
that  an  applicant  or  eligible  is  unsuitable,  the  Civil  Service 
Commission,  if  satisfied  with  the  evidence  submitted,  may  bar 
an  applicant  from  further  examination,  or,  if  already  examined, 
for  appointment,  or,  if  already  appointed,  may  even  require  his 
removal.^ 

*  "Regulations  Governing  the  Appointment  of  Postmasters  of  the 
Fourth  Class,"  U.  S.  C.  S.  C,  Form  1752. 

'  The  regulations  are  as  follows  : 

Appointment  to  offices  having  an  annual  compensation  of  less  than 
$180  shall  be  made  in  the  following  manner :  When  a  vacancy  has  oc- 
curred or  is  about  to  occur  in  any  such  office,  the  Postmaster  General 
Bhall  direct  a  post  office  inspector  to  visit  the  locality  and  make  report 
for  appointment  from  among  the  persons  filing  applications,  in  the  order 
of  their  fitness;  due  notice  of  such  visit  shall  be  made  in  the  locality  to 
be  visited ;  such  report  shall  be  based  solely  upon  the  suitability  of  the 
applicant  and  his  ability  to  provide  proper  facilities  for  transacting  the 
business  of  the  office.  The  inspector  shall  make  his  report  in  duplicate 
and  accompany  each  duplicate  with  a  list  of  all  applicants.  Such  report 
shall  include  a  statement  of  the  qualifications  of  each  applicant  and  of 
the  reasons  for  such  report.  The  Post  Office  Department  shall  transmit 
to  the  Civil  Service  Commission  one  copy  of  such  report  showing  the 
action  thereon. 

Whenever  persons  who  are  property  taxpayers  and  patrons  of  a 
post  office  having  an  annual  compensation  of  less  than  $180  submit  to 
the  Civil  Service  Commission  and  to  the  Post  Office  Department  sworn 
statements  in  duplicate,  over  their  own  signatures,  that  an  applicant,  an 
eligible,  or  an  appointee,  is  unsuitable  for  office,  giving  specific  reasons 
therefor,    the    commission    may    investigate    the    matter,    and    if    upon 


400  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

It  will  thus  be  seen  that  fourth  class  postmasterships  pay- 
ing less  than  $180/  although  in  the  competitive  classified 
service,  are  filled  without  intervention  of  the  Civil  Service 
Commission,  except  as  such  intervention  is  invoked  by  citizens 
as  to  the  unfitness  of  any  particular  candidate,  or  as  it  is  in- 
itiated by  the  Commission  because  of  suspicion  of  political 
considerations  having  entered  into  appointment.  Since  these 
orders  went  into  effect,  there  have  been  but  few  cases  in 
which  the  Commission's  intervention  was  invoked  under  the 
first  head,  or  in  which  it  has  intervened  under  the  second.  It 
may  be  said,  therefore,  with  substantial  accuracy  that  the  power 
of  selection  of  the  Post  Office  Department  as  to  these  offices 
is  uncontrolled  except  where  the  recommendation  of  the  post 
office  inspector  on  its  face  is  so  unreasonable  as  to  warrant 
the  suspicion  that  it  was  made  for  political  or  other  improper 
considerations. 

With  respect  to  the  positions  in  which  the  compensation 
is  $180  or  more,  now  numbering  about  20,000,  the  order  pro- 
vides that  appointments  "shall  be  made  in  the  same  manner 
as   provided   by   the   civil    service   laws   and   rules    for   other 

the  evidence  it  is  shown  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  commission  that,  in  the 
case  of  an  appHcant  or  an  eUgible,  he  is  unsuitable  for  appointment,  he 
shall  not  be  further  considered  for  appointment;  and  if,  in  like  manner, 
it  is  shown  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  commission  that  an  appointee  is 
unsuitable  for  office  he  shall  be  removed  after  due  procedure  required 
by  law ;  and  the  Post  Office  Department  shall,  upon  receipt  of  such  sworn 
statements  from  patrons,  suspend  appointment  in  the  case  of  an  appli- 
cant or  eligible  to  which  such  sworn  statements  may  relate  until  said 
investigation  is  made  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  and  reported. 

In  all  cases  selection  for  appointment  shall  be  made  with  sole  ref- 
erence to  merit  and  fitness  and  without  regard  to  political  or  religious 
considerations.  No  inquiry  shall  be  made  as  to  the  political  or  religious 
opinions  or  affiliations  of  any  applicant  or  eligible  and  in  conformity  with 
section  10  of  the  civil  service  act  no  recommendation  in  any  way  based 
thereon  shall  be  received  or  considered  by  any  officer  concerned  in  mak- 
ing selections  or  appointments.  The  attention  of  the  writer  of  any  such 
recommendation  shall  be  invited  to  the  purport  of  this  verbal  recom- 
mendation. Where  it  is  found  that  there  has  been  a  violation  of  these 
provisions  by  any  officer  concerned  in  making  selections  or  appointments, 
such  fact  shall  be  cause  for  the  immediate  removal  of  such  officer  from 
the  service,  and  the  Civil  Service  Commission  shall  make  prompt  report 
of  any  such  case  for  appropriate  action  to  tlie  Postmaster  General  or, 
as  to  presidential  appointees,  to  the  President.  The  appointment  of  the 
fourth  class  postmaster  concerned,   if  efTected,  shall  be  canceled. 

^  The  same  applies  to  offices  paying  more  than  $180  under  certain 
conditions. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  401 

positions  in  the  competitive  classified  service."  ^  Under  the 
original  regulations,  made  pursuant  to  the  order  of  1908,  and 
since  superseded,  the  Post  Office  Department  participated  in 
the  examinations  to  an  extent  not  permitted  to  the  appointing 
departments  in  the  case  of  any  other  class  of  positions.  Two 
types  of  examination  were  given,  according  as  the  office  paid 
as  much  as  or  less  than  $500.  In  the  examination  for  offices 
paying  less  than  $500  -  facilities  for  transacting  the  postal 
business  were  not  considered,  but  on  the  other  hand  the  rating 
was  not  competitive,  the  Post  Office  Department  being  allowed 
to  determine,  presumably  on  the  basis  of  facilities  for  trans- 
acting the  postal  business,  the  relative  standing  of  all  candi- 
dates who  had  passed  the  examination.  In  the  case  of  offices 
paying  $500  or  more,  the  examination  embraced  as  one  of 
the  subjects  of  rating  "facilities  for  transacting  the  postal 
business,"  the  rating  on  this  subject  being  determined  by  the 
Post  Office  Department  and  having  a  weight  of  three  points 
out  of  ten,  and  this  practice  was  continued  with  respect  to  of- 
fices paying  $500,  or  over,  under  the  order  of  191 2,  extending 
the  system  to  vacancies  over  the  country  as  a  whole. ^ 

Under  the  regulations  now  in  force,  however,  which  were 
promulgated  in  19 13  upon  the  extension  of  examination  to  all 
offices  paying  as  much  as  $180,  not  only  is  the  subject  of 

'  Two  cases,  however,  are  provided  for  by  the  Executive  Orders  in 
which  selection  may  be  made  in  the  discretion  of  the  Commission  even 
for  these  offices  in  the  same  way  in  which  it  is  made  where  the  compensa- 
tion is  less  than  $180.  These  are  (i)  "in  the  event  that  for  the  exam- 
ination of  any  such  office  less  than  three  persons  appear;  and  (2)  where 
no  eligibles  are  secured  by  examination."  In  connection  with  the  latter 
case  it  is  provided  that  "the  Civil  Service  Commission  shall  hold  a  sec- 
ond examination  for  each  office  which  has  an  annual  compensation  of  as 
much  as  $500,  and  for  which  no  eligibles  were  secured  as  a  result  of  the 
first  examination.  The  Commission  may  also,  in  its  discretion  hold  a 
second  examination  for  any  office  in  which  no  eligibles  were  secured  as 
a  result  of  the  first  examination,  and  which  has  an  annual  compensation 
of  between  $180  and  $500."  Thirty-fifth  Report  of  the  United  States 
Civil  Service  Commission  (1918),  pp.  109-111. 

'  Except  in  Illinois,  Massachusetts,  New  York,  and  Ohio,  where  no 
examination  was  given  for  such  offices,  appointment  being  made  on  the 
report  of  a  post  office  inspector. 

_'  Under  these  regulations  examination  was  abolished  for  positions 
paying  less  than  $500,  such  positions  being  filled  upon  the  reports  of  post 
office  inspectors,  which,  under  the  1909  regulations,  had  been  used  only 
in  the  four  states  of  Illinois,  Massachusetts,  New  York,  and  Ohio. 


402  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

"facilities  for  transacting  the  postal  business"  no  longer  an 
element  in  the  examination,  but  the  department  is  excluded 
from  any  choice  beyond  that  open  to  it  under  the  rule  requiring 
the  certification  of  three  names  for  each  vacancy,  shortly  to 
be  discussed. 

The  system  of  examination  employed  for  the  competitive 
selection  of  rural  carriers  is  also  of  special  interest  as  illustrat- 
ing the  practicability  of  applying  this  method  to  a  class  of  per- 
sonnel more  scattered  perhaps  than  any  other  class  of  public 
employees  in  the  world.  The  system  of  rural  free  delivery, 
though  established  earlier,  was  considered  an  experiment  until 
about  1901.  The  position  of  rural  carrier  remained  in  the 
excepted  class  until  November  2y,  1901,  when  President  Roose- 
velt brought  the  entire  service  into  the  classified  competitive 
service  at  one  stroke.  On  December  27,  1901,  regulations 
were  promulgated  to  become  effective  from  and  after  Feb- 
ruary I,  1902. 

The  first  regulations,  under  )vhich  the  service  was  oper- 
ated for  two  years,  provided  a  simple  test  consisting  of  filling 
out  an  application  in  the  presence  of  a  rural  agent  of  the 
Post  Office  Department,  acting  in  the  capacity  of  an  examiner 
for  the  Commission.  This  rural  agent  was  then  required  to 
make  an  investigation  of  the  reputation  of  the  competitor  in 
the  community  in  which  he  lived,  and  of  the  wishes  of  the 
patrons ;  his  report  being  used  as  a  basis  upon  which  to  deter- 
mine a  relative  merit  of  the  various  applicants.  From  the 
first  it  was  believed  that  this  policy  was  unsafe  in  that  it  af- 
forded too  great  an  opportunity  for  political  preference 
brought  about  by  influence  bearing  upon  the  agent.  But  few 
complaints  of  a  serious  nature  resulted. 

In  time  the  extent  of  the  service  rendered  it  impractical  to 
continue  this  system  on  account  of  the  large  expense  of  con- 
ducting the  examinations,  especially  in  connection  with  the 
changes  that  occurred  in  the  established  service  by  reason  of 
deaths,  resignations,  and  removals,  which  made  it  necessary 
for  the  examiner  to  visit  many  of  the  offices  frequently,  as 
often  as  three  and  four  times  during  one  year.  This  condi- 
tion caused  the  necessity  for  many  temporary  appointments 
pending  the  establishment  of  registers  from  which  certifications 


RFXRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  403 

could  be  made,  and  in  a  number  of  instances  the  suspension  of 
the  service,  owing  to  the  fact  that  it  is  difficult  to  get  suitable 
persons  to  accept  temporary  appointment.  After  consultation 
with  the  Post  Office  Department,  other  regulations  were  pro- 
mulgated on  December  3,  1903,  to  become  effective  February 
I,  1904. 

The  new  regulations,  which  have  endured  with  but  little 
change  down  to  the  present  time,  require  competitive  examina- 
tions, and,  for  a  time,  the  administration  of  these  examinations 
was  practically  under  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Post  Office  De- 
partment. In  1906,  however,  the  Commission  was  able  to  an- 
nounce that,  during  the  fiscal  year  ending  June  30,  1906,  all 
of  the  work  in  connection  with  rural  carrier  examinations  and 
certifications  had  been  conducted  by  employees  of  the  Commis- 
sion,^ 

In  191 1  the  standard  of  the  examination  was  made  the 
same  as  that  for  clerks  and  letter  carriers  in  classified  post  of- 
fices in  order  to  raise  the  standard  of  appointees  and  to  facili- 
tate transfers  between  these  classes  of  positions.  In  addition, 
the  practice  of  holding  a  separate  examination  for  each  post 
office  on  the  routes  of  which  a  vacancy  occurred  was  aban- 
doned in  favor  of  examination  by  counties,  together  with  the 
provision  for  the  certification  of  the  highest  local  eligible  and 
the  two  highest  eligibles  from  the  territory  served  by  the  re- 
maining post  offices  in  the  county. 

As  with  other  examinations  for  the  field  service,  examina- 
tions are  held  by  local  examining  boards  where  these  have 
been  organized,  but,  inasmuch  as  in  a  great  many  counties  no 
local  examining  board  exists,  it  is  necessary  in  these  counties 
to  call  upon  the  postmaster  or  other  officer  of  the  government 
to  conduct  the  examination.  From  the  apparent  absence  of 
criticism  it  may  be  concluded  that  the  conduct  of  examinations 
at  these  remote  points  by  officers  not  accustomed  to  such  service 
has  worked  more  satisfactorily  than  might  have  been  antici- 
pated. 

*  Twenty-third  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion   (1906),  p.  9. 


404  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Speed  of  Production  of  Eligible  Registers. — The  length  of 
time  which  elapses  between  the  first  announcement  of  the  ex- 
amination and  the  final  production  of  the  eligible  register  is 
another  factor  which  is  of  high  importance  in  the  effective 
working  of  a  system  of  recruitment  through  competitive  ex- 
amination. When  the  examination  is  announced  and  appli- 
cations invited,  all  those  who  respond  are  presumably  inter- 
ested in  the  position  and  will  accept  appointment  if  then  offered. 
The  longer  the  delay,  however,  before  the  actual  establishment 
of  the  eligible  register,  and  the  offering  of  appointment  to 
those  selected,  the  greater  the  likelihood  that  some,  and  usually 
the  most  desirable  of  the  competitors,  for  one  reason  or  an- 
other, will  have  lost  interest  in  the  position.  The  methods 
employed  by  the  Commission  have  reduced  the  time  inter- 
vening between  the  announcement  of  the  examination  and  the 
actual  holding  of  the  written  or  oral  tests,  where  such  tests 
are  held,  as  much  as  can  be  expected ;  far  more  in  fact  than 
has  been  the  case  with  many  local  commissions.  What  delay 
now  occurs  at  this  stage  is  so  small  as  probably  to  have  no 
effect  on  the  quality  of  the  competition.  The  interval  which 
elapses,  however,  between  the  holding  of  the  examination  and 
the  promulgation  of  the  eligible  register  is  in  many  cases  far 
too  great. 

The  chief  cause  of  the  delay  is  the  inadequacy  of  the  ex- 
amining force  of  the  Commission.  Referring  to  this  matter 
the  Chief  Examiner  of  the  Commission,  in  1915,  said: 

It  is  impossible  for  the  government  to  obtain  the  fullest 
value  from  the  commission's  work  when  the  number  of  ex- 
aminers and  clerks  is  insufficient  to  keep  abreast  of  the  ex- 
amining work  at  all  times.  By  arranging  the  schedule  in  such 
a  way  that  the  work  is  distributed  with  a  fair  degree  of  even- 
ness throughout  the  year,  as  outlined  in  my  last  report,  it  would 
be  possible,  with  an  adequate  force,  to  make  very  much  quicker 
returns  from  the  examinations.  This  would  be  of  material 
advantage  to  the  service  in  several  ways.  Vacancies  could 
be  filled  without  long  delays,  and  some  of  the  best  qualified 
competitors,  who  now  become  unavailable  by  reason  of  delays 
in  rating  their  papers,  would  not  be  lost  to  the  service.     Ex- 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  405 

aminations  for  rural  carrier,  fourth  class  postmaster,  clerk  and 
carrier  in  second  class  post  offices,  and  technical  and  scientific 
positions  can  be  held  only  after  vacancies  actually  occur  or 
are  anticipated  within  a  short  time.  Notwithstanding  every 
effort  to  expedite  the  establishment  of  registers  from  such 
examinations,  the  congestion  of  other  papers  constantly  on 
hand  necessarily  retards  the  work.  For  example,  it  is  the  de- 
sire of  the  Post  Office  Department  that  eligibles  for  rural 
carriers  be  provided  within  60  days  from  the  date  of  notifica- 
tion to  the  commission  of  a  vacancy.  Owing  to  the  inade- 
quate force  of  examiners  and  clerks  it  has  been  absolutely  im- 
possible to  comply  with  the  department's  wishes  in  this  respect. 
The  average  time  elapsing  between  the  notification  of  the  va- 
cancy and  the  certification  of  eligibles  for  rural  carrier,  under 
present  conditions,  has  been  approximately  five  months.^ 

The  provision  of  an  inadequate  force  of  examiners  for  the 
Commission  is  thus  seen  to  be  a  factor  of  primary  importance 
in  the  success  of  the  competitive  examination  system  as  a 
whole. 

In  eliminating  unqualified  candidates  by  the  successive  tests, 
and  in  eventually  promulgating  the  eligible  register,  the  Com- 
mission follows  the  practice  common  to  most  civil  service 
commissions  in  this  country  of  setting  for  each  test  a  minimum 
percentage  to  be  obtained.  It  will  be  observed  that  this  method 
bears  no  relation  to  the  prospective  needs  of  the  service.  The 
number  of  competitors  may  be  so  large  that  a  number  far  in 
excess  of  the  anticipated  needs  of  the  service  will  pass  each 
successive  test  with  a  percentage  higher  than  the  prescribed 
minimum.  Where  this  occurs  the  labor  expended  in  the  ex- 
amination and  the  placing  on  the  eligible  register  of  a  large 
proportion  of  those  receiving  lower  percentages,  is  entirely 
wasted,  since  in  the  nature  of  the  c^se  the  life  of  the  register 
must  expire  long  before  any  possible  need  for  the  services 
of  these  persons  ensues.  In  addition  to  the  waste  of  labor  there 
is  the  corresponding  delay  in  producing  the  eligible  register.  A 
more  practical  method  would  seem  to  be  to  fix,  not  a  minimum 

'  Thirty-second  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion (1915),  p.  20. 


4o6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

percentage  for  the  several  successive  tests,  but  a  maximum 
number  to  be  rated  qualified  on  each  of  the  successive  tests, 
such  number  to  be  fixed  with  relation  to  the  prospective  needs 
of  the  service.  This  method  has  been  used  with  apparently 
good  results  by  the  Canadian  Civil  Service  Commission. 
Appeals  for  Re-rating. — Owing  to  the  necessity  for  issuing 
ratings  and  making  up  eligible  registers  without  any  thorough- 
going review  by  an  authority  higher  than  the  original  ex- 
aminers, provision  is  made  in  the  practice  of  the  Commission, 
though  nowhere  mentioned  in  the  rules,  for  appeal  from  the 
original  ratings  given  by  the  Commission.  Such  appeal  may 
be  made  either  by  the  candidate,  or  by  the  department,  if  the 
Commission  permit  the  appointing  officer  to  have  access  to  the 
papers  upon  which  the  ratings  are  based.  Upon  receipt  of  such 
a  request  for  re-rating,  it  is  referred  to  a  so-called  Board  of 
Appeal,  consisting  of  the  Chief  Examiner  and  two  other  ex- 
aminers. The  recommendation  of  this  board,  reached  after 
an  examination  of  the  papers  and  relevant  facts,  is  transmitted 
to  the  Commission  itself  for  approval. 

In  the  letter  advising  candidates  of  their  ratings  the  Com- 
mission notifies  the  candidate  of  his  right  to  appeal,  but  warns 
him  that  "if  any  changes  are  made  in  the  ratings  the  chances  are 
that  they  will  be  against  the  competitors,  because,  in  the  original 
rating,  examiners  are  more  likely  to  overlook  errors  than  to 
overcharge  them."  A  sixty-day  limit  is  fixed  for  the  receipt 
of  appeals  from  competitors.  No  corresponding  limit  exists, 
however,  as  to  the  length  of  time,  after  receipt  of  certifica- 
tion, in  which  an  appeal  must  be  made  by  the  department,  and 
in  practice  the  time  limit  on  appeals  by  competitors  is  not 
rigidly  enforced. 

Military  Preference. — After  all  the  tests  comprising  an 
examination  have  been  applied  and  the  gradings  have  been  es- 
tablished, the  percentages  obtained  by  each  competitor  on  the 
various  tests  are  weighted  and  computed;  and,  on  the  basis 
of  the  final  average  thus  obtained,  the  eligible  register  is  pre- 
pared. The  arrangement  of  the  names  on  the  register  is  in 
the  order  of  percentages,  with  the  exception  that  preference 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  407 

is  given  to  those  who  have  had  certain  military  services.  The 
practice  governing  this  preference  is  clearly  of  the  first  im- 
portance. 

The  history  of  military  preference  in  the  federal  service  ex- 
tends back  to  1865,  when  Congress  enacted  that 

Persons  honorably  discharged  from  the  military  or  naval 
service  by  reason  of  disability  resulting  from  wounds  or  sick- 
ness incurred  in  the  line  of  duty  shall  be  preferred  for  ap- 
pointments to  civil  offices,  provided  they  are  found  to  possess 
the  business  capacity  necessary  for  the  proper  discharge  of  the 
duties  of  such  office.^ 

In  enacting  the  civil  service  law  Congress  specifically  re- 
tained this  preference  in  force  by  providing  that  "nothing  herein 
contained  shall  be  construed  to  take  from  those  honorably  dis- 
charged from  the  military  and  naval  service  any  preference 
conferred"  by  the  section  just  cited. ^  In  1881,  prior  to  the 
enactment  of  the  civil  service  act,  the  Attorney  General  gave 
it  as  his  opinion  that  these  provisions  meant  that  qualified 
soldiers  and  sailors  "are  entitled  to  a  preference  for  appoint- 
ment against  other  persons  of  equal  qualifications  for  the 
place,''  ^  and,  similarly,  in  1889,  that  "it  was  the  purpose  of 
Congress  to  make  it  the  duty  of  those  making  appointments 
for  civil  offices  to  give  a  preference,  other  things  being  equal, 
to  the  class  of  persons  named  in  this  section."  * 

These  opinions,  it  will  be  noted,  insist  only  upon  the  right 
of  the  disabled  soldier  to  be  preferred  to  those  of  equal  qualifi- 
cations. The  civil  service  rules,  however,  went  much  further. 
The  revision  of  the  rules  promulgated  in  1888  established  the 
principle  that  those  entitled  to  preference  should  be  preferred 
above  all  others,  of  whatever  rating,  and  that,  moreover,  they 
should  be  regarded  as  qualified  even  though  receiving  a  rating 
of  65  per  cent,  as  against  the  rating  of  70  per  cent  required 

*Act  of  March  3,  1865,  13  Stat.  571,  reenacted  as  Sec.  1754  of  the 
Revised  Statutes. 

'  Civil  Service  Act,  Sec.  7. 

'Opinion  of  the  Attorney  General,  August  13,  1R81,  17  Op.,  194. 

*  Opinion  of  the  Attorney  General,  May  24,   1889,   19  Op.,  318. 


4o8  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

of  all  non-preferred  competitors.  This  principle  has  been  re- 
tained without  change. 

By  these  provisions  the  disabled  ex-soldier  or  sailor  was 
not  only  preferred  over  all  others  who  had  passed  the  ex- 
amination but  he  was  permitted  to  pass  at  a  lower  rating,  so 
that  one  who  would  have  failed  to  qualify  had  he  not  been 
a  disabled  ex-soldier  or  sailor  might  be  given  first  call  upon 
the  position. 

Judged  on  the  basis  of  the  opinions  of  the  Attorney 
General  just  cited,  the  Commission  in  these  rules,  clearly  went 
beyond  the  mandate  of  Congress.  In  1910,  however,  the  At- 
torney General,  at  the  instance  of  the  Commission,  and  partly 
in  deference  to  its  long  standing  practice,  ruled  that  the  act 
of  1865  required  that  the  preference  granted  by  it  should  ex- 
tend "overfall  others  on  the  eligible  list,  irrespective  of  their 
rating."  ^  This  complete  reversal  of  the  rulings  of  his  pre- 
decessors was  put  by  the  Attorney  General  on  the  novel  ground 
that 

All  persons  who  have  passed  the  necessary  examination 
are,  under  the  civil  service  act  and  rules,  presumed  to  be  equally 
qualified  for  the  office  which  they  seek.  Their  rating  simply 
determines  the  order  in  which  they  shall  be  certified  for  ap- 
pointment.^ 

Even  under  this  opinion,  however,  the  Commission  was  not 
required  to  permit  a  lower  standard  of  qualification  for  those 
entitled  to  preference  than  for  other  competitors.  The  action 
of  the  Commission  on  this  point  is,  and  remains  under  the 
new  statutory  provisions  about  to  be  reviewed,  entirely  gratui- 
tous. 

Such  was  the  situation  until  a  few  months  after  the  close 
of  hostilities  in  the  recent  war.  In  February,  19 19,  in  enacting 
the  act  providing  for  the  taking  of  the  1920  census.  Congress 
inserted  a  provision  having  no  relation  to  the  act  itself  which 
required  that  • 

'Opinion  of  the  Attorney  General,  tqio,  28  Op.,  298,  302. 
'Thirty-fifth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1918),  p.  52. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  409 

hereafter  in  making  appointments  to  clerical  and  other  posi- 
tions in  the  executive  departments  and  independent  govern- 
ment establishments  preference  shall  be  given  to  honorably  dis- 
charged soldiers,  sailors,  and  marines  and  widows  of  such,  if 
they  are  qualified  to  hold  such  positions.^ 

It  is  needless  to  comment  on  the  impropriety  of  such  ex- 
tension of  the  principle  of  military  preference,  or  to  point  out 
how  much  further  it  pushes  the  principle  than  did  the  act 
of  1865,  which  controlled  for  half  a  century.  Preference  is 
extended  not  merely,  as  in  1865,  to  persons  discharged  by  rea- 
son of  disability  resulting  from  wounds  or  sickness  incurred 
in  the  line  of  duty,  but  to  all  "honorably  discharged  soldiers, 
sailors  and  marines."  A  mere  term  of  service  in  the  Army  or 
Navy  is  made  the  basis  for  a  mandatory  preference  in  all  fed- 
eral positions. 

Further  than  this,  the  same  preference  is  extended  even  to 
the  widows  of  those  in  the  preferred  class,^  a  preference  hith- 
erto unknown  to  the  law  except  for  a  provision  regarding  the 
retention  in  service  of  the  employees  of  the  temporary  census 
office  when  it  was  placed  on  a  permanent  basis.  Even  here, 
however,  the  preference  was  only  as  to  widows  of  "persons  who 
have  served  as  soldiers  in  any  war  in  which  the  United  States 
may  have  been  engaged." 

By  act  of  July  11,  1919,  this  provision  of  the  census  act 
was  substantially  reenacted.^  In  addition,  however,  preference 
was  extended  "to  the  wives  of  injured  soldiers,  sailors,  and 
marines  who  themselves  are  not  qualified  but  whose  wives  are 
qualified  to  hold  such  positions."     Whatever  may  be  thought 

'  Act  of  March  3,  1919,  40  Stat.  1293. 

*The  qualification  in  the  act,  "if  they  are  quaUfied  to  hold  such  posi- 
tions," will  be  noted.  Whether  this  qualification  applied  only  to  the 
widows  of  discharged  soldiers,  sailors,  and  marines  or  to  the  men  them- 
selves as  well,  and  if  so  how  far  it  qualified  the  principle,  are  now  imma- 
terial questions  since  by  the  act  of  July  ii,  1919,  about  to  be  mentioned, 
this  provision  was  in  effect  repealed. 

'41  Stat.  Z7-  The  words  "in  the  executive  branch  of  the  govern- 
ment in  the  District  of  Columbia  or  elsewhere"  are  substituted  for  "in 
the  executive  departments  and  in  independent  government  establish- 
ments," and  the  proviso  "if  they  are  qualified  to  hold  such  positions" 
;s  omitted, 


4IO  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

of  this  further  extension,  if  confined,  as  it  is  not  in  terms,  to 
those  who  received  their  injuries  in  action,  it  has  at  least  the 
merit  of  according  with  the  notion  of  reparation  or  compensa- 
tion which  the  other  provisos  wholly  lack,   , 

If  criticism  was  properly  directed  against  the  Commission 
for  recommending  to  the  President  the  liberal  rules  adopted 
for  giving  effect  to  the  military  preference  of  1865,  similar 
action  under  these  far  more  sweeping  rules  would  certainly 
be  open  to  much  more  severe  criticism.  Precisely  such  changes 
in  the  rules  w^ere  made,  however,  presumably  upon  the  recom- 
mendation of  the  Commission.  The  rules  were  amended  waiv- 
ing age  requirements  in  the  case  of  all  persons  preferred  under 
the  acts,  and  permitting  such  persons  to  qualify  at  a  rating  of 
65  per  cent.  In  connection  with  the  postal  examinations,  vet- 
erans are  exempted  from  the  height  and  weight  requirements. 

Those  wholly  unnecessary  concessions  to  the  military  pref- 
erence classes,  which  are  not  required  by  the  letter  of  the  acts 
and  are  not  even  implied  in  their  spirit,  are  difficult  to  reconcile 
with  the  sweeping  condemnation  visited  on  the  acts  by  the 
Commission  in  its  annual  report  for  1919.    It  says: 

The  effects  of  so  sweeping  a  preference,  while  profoundly 
demoralizing  to  the  efficiency  of  the  public  service,  will  not 
immediately  reach  its  maximum  evil.  The  number  entitled  to 
preference  will  be  at  first  so  large  that  there  will  be  a  measure 
of  competition  among  them,  but  a  few  years  hence,  when  the 
present  labor  surplus  has  been  absorbed,  and  when  the  more 
efficient  workers  among  the  soldiers  have  definitely  deter- 
mined their  vocations,  there  will  remain  chiefly  the  less  com- 
petent to  be  cared  for,  and  these  would  naturally  take  advan- 
tage of  any  preference  that  may  exist.  Ultimately  there  would 
be  a  small  number  of  candidates  at  a  more  advanced  age  for 
each  office  and  they  would  receive  the  appointments  without 
competition  to  the  exclusion  of  the  most  highly  qualified  civilian 
applicants. 

Public  office  should  not  be  regarded  as  a  gratuity,  but  as 
an  opportunity  for  service  to  the  community  by  those  most 
fitted  to  perform  that  service.  To  the  extent  that  public  of- 
fice is  an  honor  and  a  means  of  livelihood,  all  should  enjoy 
equal  opportunity  to  compete  to  gain  such  honor  and  livelihood. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  41 1 

Opposition  to  a  preference  which  takes  in  all  soldiers  and 
their  widows  should  not  be  considered  in  any  sense  as  a  dis- 
paragement of  the  services  of  our  soldiers.  This  country  has 
excelled  all  other  nations  in  acknowledging  the  value  of  such 
services  by  honors  and  distinctions  and  by  a  pension  system 
of  unexampled  liberality. 

The  merit  system  of  competitive  examination  rests  upon 
the  theory  that  service  to  the  country  in  a  civil  capacity  should 
be  an  opportunity  of  public  usefulness  offered  fairly  and 
equally  to  all  competent  citizens  according  to  their  individual 
capacity  and  fitness,  under  a  system  where  every  applicant 
has  a  "fair  field  and  no  favor,  each  standing  on  his  merits  as 
he  is  able  to  show  them  by  a  practical  test." 

The  civil  service  increasingly  demands  trained,  educated, 
ex~perienced  employees,  and  to  use  the  civil  service  as  a  reward 
for  military  service  is  an  expensive  method  of  pensioning. 
We  want  in  office  men  who  are  not  merely  just  over  the  line 
of  availability,  but  the  best  men  who  can  be  obtained :  sorted 
out  by  the  best  means;  held  to  the  highest  standard  of  ef- 
ficiency ;  made  to  feel  it  is  the  highest  honor  to  serve  the  State. 
The  future  development  of  the  United  States  will  be  dependent 
largely  on  the  efficiency  of  its  civilian  employees.  Under  the 
merit  system,  examinations  designed  to  test  relative  fitness  are 
open  and  competitive  for  all  American  citizens  who  meet  cer- 
tain preliminary  requirements,  and  appointing  officers  are  re- 
quired to  fill  vacancies  from  among  the  highest  of  these  with 
sole  regard  to  merit  and  fitness.  The  development  of  the  sci- 
entific, technical,  and  professional  work  of  the  government  has 
been  contemporaneous  with  the  development  of  examinations 
under  the  civil  service  act.  It  has  been  in  large  measure  be- 
cause of  the  merit  system  that  the  departments  have  obtained 
the  high  technical  attainments  requisite.  The  exemption  of 
veterans  from  competition  will  cripple  the  work  of  the  depart- 
ments by  forcing  the  appointment  of  veterans  who  barely  meet 
the  minimum  requirements.  A  department  needing  a  tech- 
nical expert  will  be  forced  to  accept  a  soldier  whose  training 
enables  him  to  meet  only  the  minimum  requirements,  thus 
rejecting  the  most  highly  qualified. 

The  service,  no  longer  animated  by  the  enthusiasm  of  the 
student  fresh  from  the  contact  with  the  technical  world,  can- 
not fail  to  lose  much  of  its  progressive  tendency. 

The  training  of  an  efficient  civil  administrative  officer  is 
a  long  and  expensive  process,  and  unless  the  best  possible  ma- 


4T2  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

terial  is  available  from  which  to  make  selections  the  result 
will  be  disastrous.  The  supply  of  efficient  administrators  is 
extremely  limited  at  best.  Too  much  emi)hasis  can  not  be 
laid  upon  the  imperative  necessity  of  highly  trained  adminis- 
trators and  the  most  highly  trained  clerical  force  from  which 
to  develop  such  administrators. 

Those  familiar  with  the  federal  service  at  Washington 
know  that  the  service  is  now  hampered  by  the  retention  of 
incompetents  whose  removal  is  rendered  difficult  by  influ- 
ences which  are  incompatible  with  the  efficiency  of  the  service. 
Preferences  and  exemptions  increasingly  clog  the  departments 
with  persons  wdio,  no  matter  how  inefficient,  are  difficult  to 
remove  and  whose  retention  tends  to  destroy  the  discipline  of 
the  service. 

Legislation  creating  class  distinctions  and  preference,  es- 
pecially based  upon  military  service,  is  not  consonant  with 
the  ideals  of  this  nation,  whose  founders  declared  against  the 
military  being  superior  to  the  civil  power  and  for  the  equality 
of  opportunity  for  all  men.  Those  who  serve  the  nation  in 
time  of  war  deserve  much  of  a  grateful  country.  If  the  na- 
tion wishes  to  reward  in  a  fitting  manner  those  citizens  who 
have  represented  it  in  time  of  national  peril,  there  can  be  no 
objection  raised.  It  cannot  be  called,  however,  a  fitting  re- 
ward of  patriotic  service  to  grant  to  those  who  have  rendered 
military  service  the  privilege  of  impairing  its  civil  service.-^ 

The  Commission  recommends  legislation  "permitting  the 
Commission  to  exclude  from  preference  examinations  of  a 
highly  technical,  scientific,  or  professional  character,"  a  rec- 
ommendation with  which  it  is  believed  no  one,  however  ex- 
treme an  advocate  of  military  preference,  will  take  issue.  It 
also  recommends  legislation  that  will  confine  preference  to 
disabled  soldiers,  sailors,  and  marines,  giving  them  an  addi- 
tional percentage  in  their  rating  on  examination,  instead  of 
placing  them  at  the  head  of  the  register. 

The  exception  in  favor  of  widows  of  honorably  discharged 
soldiers,  sailors,  and  marines,  if  permitted  to  remain  on  the 
statutes,  in  time  will  have  a  most  baneful  effect  upon  the  per- 
sonnel of  the  service.     In  the  nature  of  the  case  the  provision 

*  Thirty-sixth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1919)1  pp.  xvii-xix. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  413 

will  not  come  into  operation  in  most  cases  until  the  woman  who 
is  prospectively  entitled  to  its  benefits  is  well  advanced  in 
middle  life,  so  that  beginning  ten  or  fifteen  years  hence  a 
large  and  increasing  number  of  women  past  the  prime  of  life 
who,  for  the  most  part,  are  without  any  previous  experience 
in  or  training  for  the  work  of  the  government,  or  in  any 
other  related  work,  will  flow  into  the  subordinate  positions  of 
the  government. 

The  preference  extended  by  the  statutes  and  rules  applies 
only  to  certification  and  not  to  appointment.  Under  the  "one- 
in-three"  rule  shortly  to  be  considered  in  detail,  the  appointing 
officer  may  pass  over  the  veteran,  or  veteran's  wife  or  widow, 
and  appoint  one  of  the  two  other  persons  certified,  but  the 
sentimental  appeal  which  the  veteran,  or  his  wife  or  widow, 
makes  to  the  appointing  officer,  or  should  he  prove  callous, 
to  members  of  Congress  and  others  who  may  bring  pressure 
to  bear  on  the  appointing  officer,  greatly  reduces  the  importance 
of  this  factor. 

Certification  for  Apportioned  Positions. — The  civil  service 
act  requires  the  rules  formulated  by  the  President  to  provide, 
"among  other  things,"  "as  nearly  as  the  conditions  of  good 
administration  will  warrant,"  that  "appointments  to  the  public 
service  aforesaid  [that  is,  to  "the  public  service  now  classi- 
fied or  to  be  classified  hereunder"]  in  the  departments  at 
Washington  shall  be  apportioned  among  the  several  States 
and  Territories  and  the  District  of  Columbia  upon  the  basis 
of  population  as  ascertained  at  the  last  preceding  census." 
Pursuant  to  this  requirement,  the  rules  provide  (Rule  VII,  2)  : 

2.  Certification  for  appointment  in  the  departments  or  in- 
dependent offices  at  Washington  shall  be  so  made  as  to  main- 
tain, as  nearly  as  the  conditions  of  good  administration  will 
warrant,  the  apportionment  of  appointments  among  the  sev- 
eral states  and  territories  and  the  District  of  Columbia  upon 
the  basis  of  population :  Provided,  That  appointments  to  the 
following  positions  shall  not  be  so  apportioned : 

In  all  departments  and  offices :  Apprentice,  cabinet-maker, 
carpenter,  electric  lineman,  electric  wireman,  engraver,  gar- 
dener, helper   (if  approved  by  the  Commission),  messenger 


414  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

boy,  messenger  girl,  painter,  plumber,  skilled  laborer  (  female) , 
student,  and  telephone  operator. 

In  the  Government  Printing  Office,  Mail  Equipment  Shops, 
local  offices  in  the  District  of  Columbia,  field  service  of  the 
military  staff  departments,  and  at  Army  headquarters:  All 
positions. 

In  the  Bureau  of  Engraving  and  Printing:  Operative,  plate 
printer,  printer's  assistant,  and  skilled  helper. 

In  the  Office  of  the  Auditor  for  the  Post  Office  Depart- 
ment: Operative  for  the  audit  of  accounts  and  vouchers  of  the 
Postal  Service  by  means  of  labor-saving  devices. 

All  classified  positions  in  Washington  to  which  the  rule  of 
apportionment  is  applied  are  embraced  under  the  designation 
"the  apportioned  service,"  while  those  excluded  by  the  rule 
just  quoted  are  designated  "the  non-apportioned  service." 

In  making  certification  to  non-apportioned  positions,  certifi- 
cation is  made,  of  course,  in  the  order  of  the  average  percentage 
without  reference  to  the  state  of  residence  of  eligibles. 

It  will  be  observed  that  the  rule  does  not  require  the  ap- 
portionment to  be  applied  to  all  positions  not  specifically  ex- 
cepted by  it,  as  it  follows  the  wording  of  the  law  in  requiring 
that  the  apportionment  shall  be  maintained  only  "as  nearly  as 
the  conditions  of  good  administration  will  warrant."  The 
Commission,  in  practice,  has  interpreted  this  rule  as  permitting 
it  to  "waive"  the  requirement  of  apportionment  in  any  case. 
The  only  positions  for  which  it  has  so  waived  the  require- 
ments permanently  are :  sub-inspector  and  architectural  drafts- 
man. Bureau  of  Yards  and  Docks,  Navy  Department;  me- 
chanical draftsman,  Office  of  the  Chief  of  Ordnance,  War 
Department ;  and  assistant  physiologist  in  crop  utilization,  De- 
partment of  Agriculture.  In  addition,  during  the  war,  owing 
to  "the  unusual  demands  of  the  service  and  the  necessity  of 
filling  vacancies  without  delay,"  the  apportionment  was  waived 
for  the  War  and  Navy  Departments,  the  Food  Administra- 
tion, the  War  Trade  Board,  and  the  Treasury  Department, 
and  for  all  positions  of  elevator  conductor.^ 

*  Thirty-fifth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1918),  p.  57- 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  415 

The  theory  of  the  apportionment  is  to  give  each  state  the 
same  proportion  of  all  apportioned  positions  ^  as  it  has  of  the 
total  population,  but  this  is  obviously  impracticable.  The 
reasons  why  it  is  not  possible  to  make  an  exact  apportionment 
have  been  stated  by  the  Commission  to  be,  in  part,  as  follows : 

1.  When  there  are  no  eligibles  from  states  having  the 
least  share  of  appointments  it  is  necessary  that  vacancies  be 
filled  by  the  appointment  of  eligibles  from  other  states. 
Eligibles  possessing  technical  and  scientific  qualifications,  hav- 
ing been  lacking  from  certain  states,  and  male  stenographers 
and  typewriters,  for  whom  there  is  great  demand,  are  obtained 
in  relatively  greater  numbers  from  the  states  which  tend  con- 
stantly to  excess  in  their  allotment. 

2.  Whenever  a  person  is  reinstated  in  the  apportioned  serv- 
ice he  is  charged  to  the  apportionment  of  his  state,  the  rein- 
statement being  allowed  irrespective  of  the  apportionment. 

3.  Preference  in  appointment  is  given  by  law  to  veterans 
honorably  discharged  for  disability  incurred  in  the  line  of 
duty,  and  they  are  certified  for  appointment  before  all  other 
eligibles,  irrespective  of  the  apportionment,  and  their  appoint- 
ments are  charged  to  the  apportionment. 

*  Originally  the  law  was  interpreted  to  mean  that  only  original  ap- 
pointments to  the  apportioned  service  from  open  competitive  examination 
should  be  charged  to  the  quotas  of  the  several  states.  In  1910,  however, 
the  position  was  taken  that  the  charge  to  each  state  should  be  based 
on  the  number  of  persons  from  such  state  actually  in  the  apportioned 
service  at  the  given  time.  This  requires  that  record  be  made  of  all 
separations  from  the  apportioned  service,  and  also  that  account  be  taken 
of  those  persons  holding  positions  in  the  apportioned  service  who  are 
transferred  from  non-apportioned  positions  or  who  entered  originally 
other  than  by  competitive  examination — a  class  which  is,  of  course,  rap- 
idly decreasing.  The  method  of  applying  these  principles  is  thus  set 
forth  in  a  minute  of  the  Commission  adopted  April  i,  1910,  and  amended 
April  15,  1916:  "Hereafter  all  persons  entering  apportioned  positions, 
whether  through  examination,  by  Executive  order,  legislative  enactment, 
or  otherwise,  except  those  entering  such  positions  under  the  temporary 
appointment  rule,  will  be  called  upon  to  furnish  proof  of  residence,  and 
thereupon  shall  be  charged  to  the  apportionment;  and  all  persons  already 
in  the  apportioned  service  but  not  charged  to  the  apportionment  whose 
status  is  changed  from  one  position  to  another  in  such  service  upon  the 
certificate  of  the  Commission  shall,  before  such  change  of  status  is  au- 
thorized, be  required  to  furnish  proof  of  residence  and  shall  likewise  be 
charged  to  the  apportionment;  and  all  persons  already  in  the  apportioned 
service  but  not  charged  to  the  apportionment  who  file  with  the  Com- 
mission applications  for  promotion  or  other  change  of  status  in  such 
service  shall  be  required  in  connection  with  such  applications  to  furnish 
proof  of  residence,  and  when  such  proof  is  so  filed  in  the  case  of  any 
person  he  shall  be  charged  to  the  apportionment.  The  proof  of  residence 
shall  consist  of  the  usual  personal  affidavit  .  .  .  and  the  county  officer's 
certificate  under  the  act  of  July  ir,  1890." 


4i6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

4.  The  effect  of  extensions  of  the  classified  service  has 
been  to  give  to  some  states,  especially  Maryland,  Virginia,  and 
the  District  of  Columbia,  further  appointments  in  excess  of 
their  shares. 

5.  From  May  29,  1899,  to  November  26,  1901,  the  rules 
provided  that  "the  provisions  in  relation  to  apportionment 
shall  be  waived  upon  the  certification  of  the  appointing  officer 
that  the  transfer  is  required  in  the  interests  of  good  adminis- 
tration." During  the  30  months  while  this  provision  of  the 
rule  remained  in  force  it  resulted  in  approximately  130  charges 
to  the  apportionment  of  the  District  of  Columbia  alone. 

In  attempting  to  maintain  the  apportionment  the  general 
rule  is  to  give  each  appointment,  so  far  as  possible,  to  that 
state  which  to  date  has  received  the  smallest  proportion  of  its 
proper  quota  of  appointments.  In  determining  the  relative 
order  of  the  states  for  this  purpose  three  different  methods 
have  been  used.-^  The  quotation  below  outlines  the  system  now 
in  force  as  explained  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  which 
states  that  the  system  shows  accurately  at  all  times  the  relative 
standing  of  the  states  on  the  basis  of  the  total  number  of 
appointments  actually  made. 

This  system  and  its  workings  can  be  explained  by  the  use  of 
the  partial  table  on  the  following  page : 

The  total  population  of  the  States  and  Territories  and  the  District 
of  Columbia,  including  Alaska,  Porto  Rico,  and  Hawaii,  according 
to  the  census  of  19 10,  was  93,346,543.  The  second  column  shows 
for  each  State  its  per  cent  of  the  total  population,  and  its  due  share 
of   each  appointment. 

To  illustrate  the  working  of  this  system  it  may  be  said  that  on 
March  17,  191 1,  10,182  appointments  had  been  made  and  each  State 
was  therefore  entitled  to  10,182  times  its  share  of  each  appointment. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  some  states  had  received  more  and  some  less. 
The  number  of  times  its  share  of  one  appointment  which  each  state 
has  actually  received  is  shown  in  the  fifth  column,  and  this  deter- 
mines the  relative  order  for  certification  under  the  present  system. 

The  third  column  shows  the  value  to  each  state  of  each  appoint- 
ment received  by  it.     For  example,  Iowa  is  entitled  to  2.38  per  cent 

*  The  explanation  of  the  two  methods  formerly  in  use,  the  first  until 
November  29,  1897,  and  the  second  from  that  date  until  January  6, 
191 1,  is  to  be  found  in  the  Twenty-eighth  Report  of  the  United  States 
Civil  Service  Commission   (1911),  pp.   136-38. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  417 


Per   cent   of 

Times  share 

Times  share 

total  popula- 

of one  ap- 

Number of 

of  one  ap- 

State or  Ter- 

tion, which  is 
also   the   per 

pointment  in- 
volved in 

appoint- 

pointment re- 
ceived— rela- 

ritory 

cent    due    of 

each  appoint- 

ments re- 
ceived 

tive  order 

each  and  all 

ment  re- 

for certifica- 

appointments 

ceived 

tion 

United  States 

100 

I 

10,182 

10,182.00 

Iowa 

2.383345 

41.9578 

224 

9,398.54 

Wyoming 

.156368 

639.5170 

15 

9,592.76 

Nebraska 

1.277191 

78.2968 

125 

9,787.10 

Connecticut 

1.194212 

'^Z-'!Z7^ 

117 

9,797.25 

New  York 

9.763204 

10.2425 

971 

9,945-46 

Ohio 

5.106906 

19-5813 

521 

10,201.86 

Pennsylvania 

8.21 1456 

12.1781 

846 

10,302.67 

West  Virginia 

1.308156 

7^MZ\ 

143 

10,931.41 

Maine 

.795284 

125.7412 

87 

10,939.48 

of  each  appointment.  When  it  receives  an  appointment  it  receives 
41.9578  times  its  share  of  each  appointment.  The  number  in  the 
third  column  opposite  each  State  is,  therefore,  a  factor  to  be  added 
to  or  subtracted  from  the  corresponding  number  in  the  fifth  column 
every  time  a  resident  of  the  state  is  appointed  or  separated  from 
the  service.  For  example,  an  appointment  given  to  Nebraska  in- 
creases its  number  in  the  fifth  column  by  78.2968,  or  to  9,865.39,  and 
drops  it  below  Connecticut  in  order  of  certification. 

On  March  17,  191 1,  the  United  States  as  a  whole  had  received 
10,182  appointments,  which  is  10,182  times  its  share  of  one  appoint- 
ment. Any  State  which  had  received  more  than  10,182  times  its 
share  of  one  appointment  was  in  excess,  while  any  that  had  received 
less  than  10,182  times  its  share  of  one  appointment  was  in  arrears. 
The  number  of  appointments  to  which  a  state  is  entitled  at  any  time 
may  be  found  by  multiplying  the  total  number  of  appointments  by 
its  per  cent  of  the  total  population.  The  per  cent  of  its  share  which 
any  State  has  received  may  be  found  by  dividing  the  number  in  the 
fifth  column  showing  the  total  number  of  times  its  share  of  one  ap- 
pointment received  by  the  total  number  of  appointments  received  by 
all  the  States  and  Territories. 1 

The  relative  order  of  the  states  being  thus  determined,  the 
next  appointment  wotild  be  made,  if  regard  were  had  solely 
to  the  apportionment,  and  if  practicable,  from  the  state  at  the 
head  of  the  list,  and  if  no  candidate  was  available  from  that 

^Ih'xd.,  p.  138. 


4i8  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

state  then  from  the  state  next  on  the  list,  and  so  on ;  and  this 
was  at  one  time  the  procedure.  In  recent  years,  however,  the 
Commission  has  adopted  a  method  which  quaHfies  somewhat 
the  strict  and  unmitigated  appHcation  of  the  rule  of  apportion- 
ment. Its  procedure  now  has  two  variations;  one  being  ap- 
plied to  all  scientific  and  technical  positions  and  to  positions 
of  stenographer  and  typewriter  paying  more  than  $900  a  year, 
while  the  second  method  is  applied  to  all  other  apportioned 
positions.     The  first  method  is  as  follows :  ^ 

With  the  view  of  deferring  the  certification  of  eligibles 
with  very  low  ratings  from  technical,  scientific,  and  profes- 
sional registers  until  practically  all  those  with  better  ratings 
had  been  certified,  the  Commission,  in  1910,  established  the 
following  method  of  certification  for  scientific,  technical,  and 
professional  positions  and  positions  of  stenographer  and  type- 
writer paying  more  than  $900 :  Dividing  the  States  and  Ter- 
ritories into  two  groups,  the  first  group  constituted  those  that 
have  not  received  their  proportionate  share  of  appointments 
and  the  second  group  those  that  have  received  more  than  their 
proportionate  share,  certification  is  made  in  the  following  or- 
der: (i)  all  eligibles  in  order  of  average  percentage  from  the 
whole  group  of  states  in  arrears  with  averages  down  to  and 
including  75;  (2)  in  like  manner  from  the  whole  group  of 
states  in  excess  except  the  two  last  states  and  the  District  of 
Columbia;  (3)  from  the  whole  group  of  states  in  arrears  down 
to  and  including  73;  (4)  in  like  manner  as  in  (2)  down  to  and 
including  73;  (5)  all  remaining  eligible  in  order  of  average 
percentage  from  the  whole  group  of  states  in  arrears;  (6)  the 
same  as  (2)  and  (4)  of  all  remaining  eligibles;  (7)  in  order 
of  their  standing  under  the  apportionment  from  the  last  two 
states  and  the  District  of  Columbia. 

The  method  which  is  applied  to  all  other  apportioned  posi- 
tions is  as  follows : 

I.  Certification  is  made  of  the  highest  eligibles  from  one- 
half  of  the  entire  group  of  States  and  Territories  that  have 
not  received  their  full  share  of  the  total  number  of  appoint- 
ments actually  made  (if  the  number  of  such  States  and  Ter- 

*  Twenty-ninth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion   (1912),  p.   19. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  419 

ritories  is  uneven,  the  lesser  number  is  taken)  and  this  method 
is  followed  until  all  the  eligibles  from  such  states  and  terri- 
tories have  been  certified  with  average  percentages  of  as  much 
as  80. 

2.  After  all  the  eligibles  described  in  (i)  above  have  thus 
been  certified,  then  certification  is  made  in  the  same  manner 
from  one-half  of  the  remainder  of  such  group  of  States  and 
Territories. 

3.  After  all  the  eligibles  described  in  (2)  above  have  thus 
been  certified,  then  certification  is  made  in  the  same  manner 
from  the  remainder  of  such  group  of  States  and  Territories. 

4.  After  all  the  eligibles  described  in  (3)  above  have  thus 
been  certified,  then  certification  is  made  as  described  in  ( i ) 
above  down  to  and  including  eligibles  with  percentages  of  as 
much  as  75. 

5.  After  all  the  eligibles  described  in  (4)  above  have 
thus  been  certified,  then  certification  is  made  as  described  in 
(2)  above  down  to  and  including  eligibles  with  percentages  of 
as  much  as  75. 

6.  After  all  the  eligibles  described  in  (5)  above  have  thus 
been  certified,  then  certification  is  made  as  described  in  (3) 
above  down  to  and  including  eligibles  with  percentages  of  as 
much  as  75. 

7.  After  all  the  eligibles  described  in  (6)  above  have  thus 
been  certified,  then  certification  is  made  from  the  other  States, 
in  their  order  under  the  apportionment  of  eligibles  with  an 
average  percentage  of  as  much  as  75  down  to  the  two  States 
having  the  largest  excess  of  their  share  of  appointments  and 
the  District  of  Columbia. 

8.  After  all  the  eligibles  described  in  (7)  above  have  thus 
been  certified,  then  certification  is  made  of  the  highest  remain- 
ing eligibles  from  the  entire  group  of  States  in  arrears  of  their 
share,  in  the  order  of  percentage,  who  have  percentages  of 
as  much  as  73. 

9.  After  all  the  eligibles  described  in  (8)  above  have  thus 
been  certified,  then  certification  is  made  as  described  in  (7) 
above  down  to  and  including  eligibles  with  percentages  of  as 
much  as  "J2>- 

10.  After  all  the  eligibles  have  thus  been  certified  with 
averages  of  as  much  as  73  down  to  the  two  States  that  have 
received  the  greatest  excess  of  their  share  and  the  District  of 
Columbia,  then  certification  is  made  of  the  highest  remaining 
eligibles  from  the  entire  group  of  States  and  Territories  in  ar- 


420  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

rears  of  their  share;  and  after  all  eligibles  from  such  group 
of  States  and  Territories  have  been  certified,  then  certification 
is  made  from  each  State  and  Territory  in  its  order  under  the 
apportionment.^ 

The  following  explanation  of  the  reason  for  this  variation 
has  been  given  by  the  Secretary  to  the  Commission :  - 

In  the  ordinary  clerical  registers,  a  difference  of  a  few 
points  in  rating  is  not  so  important  as  in  the  case  of  regis- 
ters of  experts  and  stenographers  and  typewriters.  Nearly 
every  State  and  Territory  is  represented  on  the  ordinary  reg- 
isters, but  for  most  of  the  technical  registers  a  few  states  only 
furnish  eligibles.  The  present  method  insures  the  certification 
of  most  of  the  eligibles  with  the  higher  ratings  before  those 
with  lower  averages,  while  at  the  same  time  the  principle  of 
the  apportionment  is  jealously  guarded. 

Stringent  regulations  governing  proof  of  residence  of 
competitors  are  prescribed  to  prevent  frauds  on  the  apportion- 
ment wherein  candidates  claim  residence  in  states  which  are 
in  arrears  and  thereby  secure  preference  in  appointment.  The 
civil  service  law  itself  provides,  in  the  same  clause^  which 
enacts  the  principle  of  apportionment,  "that  every  application 
for  an  examination  shall  contain,  among  other  things,  a  state- 
ment under  oath,  setting  forth  his  or  her  actual  bona  fide  resi- 
dence at  the  time  of  making  the  application,  as  well  as  how 
long  he  or  she  has  been  a  resident  of  such  place."  In  addi- 
tion Congress  provided  in  1890  that: 

Hereafter  every  application  for  examination  before  the 
Civil  Service  Commission  for  appointment  in  the  departmental 
service  in  the  District  of  Columbia  shall  be  accompanied  by  a 
certificate  of  an  officer,  with  his  official  seal  attached,  of  the 
county  and  state  of  which  the  applicant  claims  to  be  a  citizen, 
that  such  applicant  was,  at  the  time  of  making  such  applica- 
tion, an  actual  and  bona  fide  resident  of  said  county,  and  had 
been  such  resident  for  a  period  of  not  less  than  six  months  next 
preceding.^ 

*  Thirty-fifth  Report  of  tlic  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1918),  p.  99- 

'  In  a  memorandum  to  the  Institute  for  Government  Research, 
'Act  of  July  II,  1890,  26  Stat.  235. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  421 

In  addition  Congress,  in  1909,  enacted  the  restrictive  re- 
quirement that : 

All  examinations  of  applicants  for  positions  in  the  govern- 
ment service,  from  any  state  or  territory,  shall  be  had  in  the 
state  or  territory  in  which  such  applicants  reside,  and  no  per- 
son shall  be  eligible  for  such 'examination  or  appointment  un- 
less he  or  she  shall  have  been  actually  domiciled  in  such  state 
or  territory  for  at  least  one  year  previous  to  such  examination. 

This  provision,  because  of  its  context,  is  interpreted  as 
applying  to  examinations  for  apportioned  positions  only.^ 

Regardless  of  what  may  be  thought  of  the  wisdom  of  the 
whole  system  of  apportionment,  this  last  provision  seems  un- 
duly restrictive.  Since  the  apportionment  rule  applies  even  to 
technical  positions,  it  goes  to  the  palpably  absurd  limit  of 
barring  from  examination  a  prospective  applicant  who  has 
moved  into  a  state  within  a  year,  perhaps  in  pursuance  of  his 
profession  or  technical  occupation,  and  is  therefore  unable  to 
establish  the  required  actual  domicile  in  such  state  or  territory 
for  at  least  one  year  previous  to  the  examination. 

The  Commission  has  even  gone  so  far  as  to  require  com- 
petitors in  "nonassembled"  examinations  to  show  that  they 
have  been  actually  domiciled  in  the  state  or  territory  in  which 
they  reside  for  at  least  one  year  previous  to  the  examination. 

Yet  it  has  ruled  in  another  connection,  and  the  ruling  has 
been  concurred  in  by  the  Attorney  General,  that  "these  ex- 
aminations are  not  'had'  at  any  particular  place  and  Congress 
in  enacting  this  statute  seems  to  have  had  in  mind  the 
examinations  referred  to  in  Section  3  of  the  Civil  Service 
Act,  held  by  local  boards  of  examiners."  -  This  being  the 
case  the  provision  that  no  person  shall  be  eligible  for  "such" 

^Act  of  July  2,  1909,  26  Stat.  3.  During  the  war  this  restriction 
was  waived  by  Congress  (Resohition  of  March  27,  1918.  40  Stat.  459) 
in  order  to  permit  of  the  examination,  principally  at  Washington,  of 
large  numbers  of  persons  who  had  come  to  Washington  from  distant 
points  to  secure  employment  with  the  government  in  ignorance  of  the 
statute  requiring  them  to  be  examined  in  their  state  of  residence. 

*  Thirty-fifth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1918),  p.  20. 


422  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

examination  or  appointment  unless  he  or  she  shall  have 
been  actually  domiciled  in  "such"'  state  or  territory  for 
at  least  one  year  previous  to  "such"  examination,  would  seem 
to  have  no  application  whatever  to  a  non-assembled  examina- 
tion. 

The  Commission  apparently  has  displayed  at  this  point,  as  it 
has  at  some  others,  an  almost  too  tender  regard  for  the  re- 
strictions which  Congress  has  enacted.  It  is  not  intended  to 
imply  that  the  Commission  should  not  scrupulously  observe 
all  statutory  directions  enacted  by  Congress;  but  if  a  statute 
is  fairly  susceptible  of  an  interpretation  more  in  accord  with 
the  requirements  of  sound  personnel  administration  than  an 
absolutely  literal  construction  would  be,  it  is  submitted  that 
it  is  the  Commission's  duty  to  adopt  the  former  interpretation. 
The  reluctance  of  the  Commission  to  do  so  both  in  this  and 
in  other  connections  is  doubtless  due,  in  large  measure,  to  a 
feeling  on  its  part,  perhaps  amply  warranted  by  its  experience, 
that  not  a  few  Congressmen  are  latently  hostile  to  the  whole 
regime  of  open  competition,  and  that  any  deviation  from  the 
strictest  obedience  to  the  letter  of  the  statute  may  be  seized 
upon  and  made  much  of  by  these  Congressional  critics. 

The  general  question  of  the  wisdom  of  the  apportionment 
system  was  discussed  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  in  its 
report  for  the  fiscal  year  1912,  in  which  it  said: 

It  has  been  said  that  under  the  apportionment  persons  re- 
ceive appointment  who  are  inferior  in  qualifications  to  those 
who  would  be  obtained  if  competition  were  as  wide  as  the 
country;  that  the  apportionment  is  distinctly  an  interference 
with  the  merit  system,  is  inconsistent  with  it,  and  that  it  is 
harmful  to  the  public  service  in  that  so  far  as  it  operates  at 
all,  the  highest  in  the  examinations  often  fail  of  appointment; 
that  considered  purely  from  an  economical  standpoint  the  ap- 
portionment cannot  be  justified;  that  government  appoint- 
ments should  be  distributed  as  far  as  at  all  practicable  on  a 
basis  of  efficiency,  and  that  there  is  nothing  in  the  natural  dis- 
tribution of  population  that  corresponds  to  or  coincides  with 
the  distribution  of  trained  capacity. 

The  distribution  of  appointments  among  the  states,  how- 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  423 

ever,  is  in  accord  with  our  federal  system  of  government,  under 
which  all  the  people  from  all  the  states  are  entitled  to  serve 
the  government.  The  requirement  of  an  apportionment  pro- 
ceeds upon  the  theory  that  the  competition  for  appointment  is 
not  from  all  the  states  together  but  from  all  those  within  each 
state  separately,  the  government  being  representative  of  the 
several  states  according  to  their  population.  A  fundamental 
principle  in  the  establishment  of  the  federal  government  was 
not  only  the  representation  of  every  state  but  a  representation 
which  should  embody  an  integral  portion  of  the  state  itself. 
Thus  Senators  and  Representatives  are  not  chosen  at  large  but 
must  be  inhabitants  of  the  state  in  which  they  are  chosen,  an 
intended  departure  from  the  British  system.  The  representa- 
tive feature  was  established,  based  upon  inhabitancy  of  the 
state  as  the  nearest  practical  approximation  to  the  personal 
participation  of  the  whole  people  in  the  government.  The 
theory  in  the  civil  service  law  is  that  every  citizen,  no  matter 
how  humble  his  condition  or  in  what  part  of  the  country  he 
may  reside,  may  justly  feel  that  as  a  citizen  of  a  state  he  has 
equally  with  the  citizen  of  every  other  state  a  commensurate 
interest  and  right  to  participation  in  the  general  government. 
Thus  it  is  regarded  as  an  injustice  by  the  people  of  a  state  or 
section  of  the  country  that  another  state  or  section  should 
receive  a  share  of  the  representation  greatly  disproportioned  to 
its  population. 

President  Washington  enumerated  among  the  three  things 
essential  in  appointments  that  in  as  equal  a  proportion  as  might 
be  they  should  be  given  to  persons  belonging  to  the  different 
states  in  the  Union.  This  principle  of  apportionment,  open- 
ing to  all  the  door  to  the  public  service,  has  been  adopted  by 
Congress  upon  every  occasion  where  it  would  be  applicable. 
Illustration  of  this  will  be  found  in  an  act  of  1875  relating 
to  appointments  in  the  Treasury  Department,  and  in  the  laws 
regulating  the  apportionment  of  cadets  at  West  Point  and  of 
midshipmen  at  the  Naval  Academy.  Executive  orders  also 
require  an  apportionment  of  appointments  among  the  states  in 
the  appointments  made  through  examination  in  the  Diplomatic 
and  Consular  Services,  These  laws  and  orders  bear  out  the 
spirit  and  genius  of  our  institutions — that  this  is  a  govern- 
ment by  the  people  acting  through  their  several  states,  and 
that  representation  in  the  common  government  shall  be  appor- 
tioned among  the  several  states  by  their  inhabitants  serving 
in  the  legislative  and  executive  departments,  in  the  Army  and 


424  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Navy,  and  in  our  foreign  services,  all  sections  of  the  Union 
thus  contributing  to  the  labors  of  the  government. 

Not  only  is  this  a  matter  of  inherent  right  upon  the  part 
of  the  states,  but  it  is  in  accord  with  a  wise  public  policy  and 
with  the  progress  in  education  and  patriotic  achievement  among 
the  people  of  the  several  states.  Distribution  and  appoint- 
ments among  the  states  bring  to  the  seat  of  government  per- 
sons wdio  represent  the  views  of  every  community  and  who  be- 
come acquainted  with  the  operations  of  the  national  govern- 
ment, all  sections  of  the  Union  thus  participating  in  its  work, 
and  this  in  turn  inspiring  an  interest  therein  among  all  the 
people.  In  this  way  every  section,  however  remote,  is  brought 
into  contact  with  the  central  government,  intelligence  and  in- 
terest regarding  its  operations  are  diffused,  patriotism  pro- 
moted, the  grow'th  of  sectionalism  prevented,  unreasonable 
prejudices  overcome,  and  an  enlightened  understanding  pro- 
moted respecting  the  aims  and  purposes  of  our  common  coun- 
try. It  is,  therefore,  the  part  of  wisdom  that  to  the  people  of 
every  state  should  be  secured  the  opportunity,  as  far  as  they 
are  willing  and  as  far  as  they  can  furnish  the  needed  charac- 
ter and  capacity,  to  enter  a  competition,  not  with  people  within 
their  own  states,  to  participate  proportionately  with  the  people 
of  the  other  states  in  the  conduct  of  the  government  of  which 
their  state  is  a  constituent. 

In  this  gathering  at  Washington  of  clerks  representing 
every  part  of  the  country,  associated  in  the  common  business 
of  government,  sympathetic  relations  are  established  and  in- 
formation diffused  which  extends  to  every  part  of  the  country, 
vitalizing  the  central  government  and  securing  popular  sup- 
port for  it.  If  further  reasons  were  necessary  for  a  contin- 
uance of  the  apportionment  provision  of  the  law,  there  miglit 
be  mentioned  the  possible  effect  upon  the  service  of  its  dis- 
continuance. If  the  apportionment  provision  were  repealed, 
in  the  very  nature  of  things  an  ever  increasing  proportion  of 
appointments  would  go  to  eligibles  residing  in  the  District  of 
Columbia  and  nearby  states.  As  such  a  condition  continued 
and  increased,  it  is  believed  the  effect  upon  the  service  in  the 
department  at  Washington  would  be  seriously  detrimental, 
occasioned  by  lack  of  general  interest  in  such  service  and  finally 
in  consequent  lack  of  adequate  appropriations  to  carry  it 
on,^ 

'  Twenty-ninth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1912),  pp.   19-21. 


RECRUITMENT  MI-miODS:  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  425 

Examination  of  this  defense  of  the  principles  of  apportion- 
ment, the  most  extensive  to  be  found  anywhere  in  official 
sources,  discloses  that  not  one  of  the  objections  to  the  ap- 
portionment which  are  set  out  in  its  opening  paragraph  are 
met  in  its  subsequent  discussion.  All  that  the  substantive  part 
of  this  quotation  goes  to  establish  is  that  the  principle  of  ap- 
portionment is  basically  and  inherently  desirable,  a  contention 
which  will  hardly  be  disputed.  The  practical  question  is  how 
far  may  this  beneficent  principle,  which  is  not  in  and  of  itself 
•a  principle  of  personnel  administration  at  all,  be  carried  in 
actual  application  without  impairing  the  efficiency  of  the 
service.  The  Commission  urges  that  it  is  "the  part  of  wis- 
dom that  to  the  people  of  every  state  should  be  secured  the 
opportunity  ...  to  participate  proportionately  with  the  peo- 
ple of  other  states  in  the  conduct  of  the  government  of  which 
every  state  is  a  constituent  ...  as  far  as  they  can  furnish  the 
needed  character  and  capacity."  It  is  precisely  this  qualifica- 
tion which  is  the  subject  of  dispute.  Does  or  does  not  the  pres- 
ent application  of  the  principle  of  apportionment  result  in  the 
appointment  of  persons  who  cannot  furnish  the  needed  char- 
acter and  capacity  as  well  as  can  other  persons  who  are  barred 
from  appointment  ? 

It  is  doubtless  improbable  that  under  present  methods  the 
apportionment  works  for  any  serious  impairment  of  the  caliber 
of  the  persons  appointed  to  the  ordinary  run  of  clerical  or 
routine  positions  for  which  qualifications  are  more  or  less 
standardized  and  for  which  a  reasonable  abundance  of  quali- 
fied persons  can  be  ol>tained  in  almost  every  state  of  the 
Union.  With  respect  to  technical  and  scientific  positions,  how- 
ever, the  situation  is  far  otherwise.  Here  it  not  infrequently 
happens  that  a  whole  register  contains  but  few  names  and  that 
the  variation  in  capacity  between  the  higher  and  lower  names 
on  the  register  is  wide.  Where  this  is  the  case,  the  preference 
in  certification  given  to  eligibles  from  states  in  arrears  in 
their  quota  may  serve  to  bring  within  the  certification  the 
lowest  persons  on  the  list,  while  excluding  from  it  the  highest 
persons.   Where  such  a  result  ensues  it  can  hardly  be  disputed 


426  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

that  the  effect  of  the  apportionment  is  extremely  destriictiv' 
of  efficiency  in  the  service  and  far  outweighs  any  general  ad- 
vantages which  may  be  claimed  for  the  principle  of  apportion- 
ment in  the  abstract. 

Administrative  officers  are  undoubtedly  considerably  dis- 
satisfied with  the  results  of  the  apportionment  system.  They 
commonly  regard  it,  however,  as  so  firmly  established  a  fea- 
ture of  the  personnel  system  that  they  are  seldom  moved 
to  make  objection  to  it  officially.  One  of  the  few  instances 
in  which  this  has  been  done  is  found  in  the  annual  report  of 
the  Secretary  of  Commerce  and  Labor  for  1910,  in  which  he 
says,  referring  to  the  provision  requiring  the  apportionment :  ' 

It  is  very  doubtful  whether  the  benefits  of  this  particular 
provision  of  law  outweigh  its  manifest  disadvantages.  While 
the  civil  service  tests  undoubtedly  furnish  the  best  guaranty  for 
appointment  upon  merit,  the  demand  for  geographical  distri- 
bution necessarily  restricts  the  freedom  of  choice.  For  some 
reasons  it  may  be  desirable  to  have  the  employees  of  the  civil 
branch  of  the  government  represent  the  various  states  and 
sections  of  the  country,  but  it  is  a  question  whether  such  a  pol- 
icy is  of  sufficient  importance  to  outweigh  the  tests  which  the 
law  provides  to  determine  the  merits  and  qualifications  of  ap- 
plicants. If  the  service  is  to  be  maintained  on  that  high  plane 
of  efficiency  which  is  so  urgently  demanded,  it  seems  only  fair 
to  grant  to  the  departments  the  privilege  of  selecting  the  per- 
sons who  have  obtained  the  highest  marks  on  examination, 
and  not  be  compelled  to  consider  eligibles  with  poor  markings 
simply  because  they  claim  legal  residence  in  states  whose 
quotas  are  not  in  excess. 

It  is  to  be  remembered  that  this  comment  was  made  at  a 
time  when  the  method  of  applying  the  apportionment  was  such 
as  to  necessitate  the  appointment  of  the  lowest  eligible  on 
the  list,  having  perhaps  only  the  minimum  mark  required  for 
passing,  in  preference  to  the  eligible  first  on  the  list,  if  the 
lowest  eligible  came  from  a  state  further  in  arrears  than  the 
highest  eligible.     The  method  of  applying  the  apportionment 

*  Twenty-seventh  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion   (1910),  P-   138. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  427 

now  in  force,  as  above  described,  gives  less  weight  to  the 
apportionment  and  greater  weight  to  the  order  of  the  ehgibles 
on  the  register.  The  criticism  made  by  the  Secretary  of  Com- 
merce and  Labor  would  by  no  means  be  as  applicable  to  the 
present  method  of  applying  the  apportionment  as  it  was  to 
the  method  in  force  at  the  time  he  wrote. 

That  the  Commission  itself  has  more  recently  weakened  in 
its  enthusiasm  for  the  apportionment  is  evidenced  by  state- 
ments appearing  in  its  report  for  the  fiscal  year  19 18,  intro- 
ductory to  a  statement  of  those  instances  already  referred  to 
in  which,  because  of  the  war  emergency,  the  requirement  of 
apportionment  was  waived  for  some  of  the  important  war 
agencies.  After  explaining  why  the  waiving  of  the  apportion- 
ment was  necessary  to  prevent  delay  under  the  emergency 
condition  obtaining,  it  goes  on  to  make  the  general  statement 
that 

The  enforcement  of  the  apportionment  rule  also  frequently 
results  in  the  appointment  of  persons  barely  making  a  passing 
grade  in  the  examination  in  preference  to  persons  from  states 
which  have  already  received  their  share  of  appointments  who 
obtained  higher  ratings.  The  waiver  of  the  apportionment, 
which  would  permit  the  appointment  of  many  local  eligibles 
who  would  not  otherwise  have  been  reached,  would  not  only 
result  in  a  more  expeditious  filling  of  vacancies  but  would  ac- 
complish the  appointment  of  persons  familiar  with  local  con- 
ditions who  would  be  more  content  in  their  employment  and 
more  desirable  in  many  ways.  .  .  .^ 

This  statement  is  made,  however,  in  an  obscure  place  in 
the  appendix  to  the  Commission's  report,  and  without  the  re- 
sponsibility of  any  particular  individual.  If  it  correctly  rep- 
resents the  views  of  the  Commission  on  the  apportionment 
at  this  time,  it  should  have  been  given  greater  prominence. 

Finally,  it  should  be  pointed  out  that  the  apportionment 
system  adds  greatly  to  the  work  and  expense  of  the  recruit- 
ment system,  both  through  the  extra  labor  that  it  entails  and 

^Thirty-fifth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1918),  p.  98. 


428  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

through  the  frequent  necessity  for  holding  examinations  at 
many  different  points. 

Restriction  of  Certification  of  Members  of  Same  Family. 
— Another  peculiarity  connected  with  certification  to  positions 
in  the  classified  competitive  service  arises  from  Section  9  of 
the  civil  service  act,  which  provides  that  "whenever  there  are 
already  two  or  more  members  of  a  family  in  the  public  service 
in  the  grades  covered  by  this  act,  no  other  member  of  such 
family  shall  be  eligible  to  the  appointment  to  any  of  said 
grades."  Accordingly  in  the  notice  of  rating  which  the  Com- 
mission sends  to  applicants  upon  the  establishment  of  an  eligible 
register,  it  calls  attention  to  this  provision  of  the  law  and  warns 
the  eligible  of  the  necessity  of  promptly  notifying  the  Com- 
mission of  the  appointment  of  any  member  of  the  eligible's 
family  to  the  service. 

The  enforcement  of  this  section  has  given  rise  to  some 
niceties  in  legal  reasoning  as  to  the  exact  meaning  of  the 
term  "family,"  it  having  on  one  occasion  been  ruled  by  the 
Attorney  General  that  one  who  had  removed  from  the  parental 
roof  had  "severed  the  family  relationship  and  become,  as  it 
were,  independent  thereof,"  and  had  thus  "ceased  to  be  a 
member  of  the  'family'  within  the  meaning  of  the  law."  Into 
these  subtleties  it  would  be  of  no  value  to  enter  in  this  dis- 
cussion. 

It  is  difficult  to  see  what  substantial  purpose  is  served 
by  this  provision  of  the  law.  At  the  time  it  was  enacted  it 
was  doubtless  intended  to  assist  the  general  purpose  of  pre- 
venting appointment  for  political  or  personal  reasons,  but 
the  present  development  of  the  methods  of  selection  renders 
such  an  excess  of  caution  unnecessary.  The  continuance  of 
the  rule  cannot  be  said  to  work  any  positive  harm,  but  it  does 
occasionally  work  hardship  and  inconvenience,  both  to  appli- 
cants and  to  the  service,  and  it  occasions  a  not  inconsiderable 
amount  of  clerical  labor.  Moreover,  the  difficulty  of  enforcing 
this  rule  and  the  variety  of  ways  in  which  it  may  be  evaded 
are  so  great  that  inevitably  its  enforcement  is  unequal.  It 
also  works  unjust  discrimination  in  many  cases  where  it  is 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  429 

enforced.  On  all  counts  it  would  seem  that  its  repeal  is  de- 
sirable. 

The  "Three-Name"  Certification  Rule. — As  has  already 
been  seen,  the  rule  governing  certification  fn  -a  those  lists 
where  certification  is  required  provides  (Rule  VII,  i,  a)  that 
there  shall  be  certified  "a  number  of  names  suflficient  to  permit 
the  nominating  or  appointing  officer  to  consider  three  names  in 
connection  with  each  vacancy" ;  and,  where  appointment  direct 
from  the  register  is  permitted,  a  corresponding  number  of 
names  is  available  to  the  appointing  officer.^  The  intent  of 
these  provisions  is  more  fully  defined  by  the  rules  as  follows 
(Rule  VII,  I,  b)  : 

The  nominating  or  appointing  officer  shall  make  selection 
for  the  first  vacancy  from  not  more  than  the  highest  three 
names  certified,  or  on  the  register,  with  sole  reference  to  merit 
and  fitness,  unless  objection  shall  be  made,  and  sustained  by 
the  commission,  to  one  or  more  of  the  persons  certified,  for 
any  of  the  reasons  stated  in  Rule  V,  section  4,  For  the  sec- 
ond vacancy  he  shall  make  selection  from  not  more  than  the 
highest  three  remaining,  who  have  not  been  within  his  reach 
for  three  separate  vacancies,  or  against  whom  objection  has 
not  been  made  and  sustained  in  the  manner  indicated.  The 
third  and  any  additional  vacancies  shall  be  filled  in  like  man- 
ner. More  than  one  selection  may  be  made  from  the  three 
names  next  in  order  for  appointment,  or  from  two  names  if 
the  register  contains  only  two,  subject  to  the  requirements 
of  section  2  of  this  rule  as  to  the  apportionment.  Any  eligible 
who  has  been  within  reach  for  three  separate  vacancies  in  his 
turn  may  be  subsequently  selected,  subject  to  the  approval  of 

*  It  is  further  provided  by  Rule  VIII,  paragraph  3,  that  "when  there 
is  at  least  one  eligible  and  not  more  than  two  eligibles  on  a  register  for 
any  grade  in  which  a  vacancy  exists,  the  commission  shall,  upon  requisi- 
tion from  the  proper  appointing  officer,  certify  the  name  of  the  one 
eligible  or  the  names  of  the  two  eligibles,  which  shall  be  considered  by 
the  appointing  officer  with  a  view  to  probational  appointment;  and  if  the 
appointing  officer  shall  elect  not  to  make  probational  appointment  from 
such  certificate  of  less  than  three  names,  then  if  temporary  appointment 
is  required,  it  shall  be_  made  from  such  certificate  unless  reasons  sat- 
isfactory to  the  commission  are  given  why  such  appointment  should 
not  be  made.  Such  temporary  api^ointmeut  may  continue  until  three 
eligibles  are  provided.  If  selection  fs  not  made  from  the  certificate  "for 
either  probational  or  temporary  appointment  under  the  provisions  of  this 
section,  then  temporary  appointment,  if  required,  may  be  made  under 
the  provisions  of  section  2  of  this  rule." 


)    / 


430  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

the  commission,  from  the  certificate  on  which  his  name  last 
appeared,  if  the  condition  of  the  register  has  not  so  changed  as 
to  place  his  in  other  respects  beyond  reach  of  certification. 

It  will  be  observed  that  the  rule  provides  that  the  appoint- 
ing officer  must  make  his  selection  from  the  three  names  certi- 
fied for  each  given  vacancy,  "unless  objections  shall  be  made 
and  sustained  by  the  Commission  to  one  or  more  of  the  per- 
sons certified  for  any  of  the  reasons  stated  in  Rule  V,  Section 
4."     The  reasons  set  out  in  the  rule  referred  to  are 

(a)  Dismissal  from  the  service  for  delinquency  or  mis- 
conduct within  one  year  next  preceding  the  date  of  his  appli- 
cation; (b)  physical  or  mental  unfitness  for  the  position  for 
which  he  applies;  (r)  criminal,  infamous,  dishonest,  immoral, 
or  notoriously  disgraceful  conduct;  (d)  intentionally  making 
a  false  statement  in  any  material  fact,  or  practicing  any  de- 
ception or  fraud  in  securing  examination,  registration,  cer- 
tification, or  appointment;  (e)  refusal  to  furnish  testimony  as 
required  by  Rule  XIV  ;^  (/)  the  habitual  use  of  intoxicating 
beverages  to  excess. 

While  these  permissible  reasons  for  objecting  to  an  eligible 
are,  for  the  most  part,  of  a  kind  involving  a  serious  reflection 
on  his  character,  it  will  be  noted  that  one  of  them  specifies 
merely  "physical  or  mental  unfitness  for  the  position  for  which 
he  applies."  A  strict  interpretation  of  this  provision  of  the 
rule  by  the  Commission  doubtless  would  require  the  appoint-| 
ing  officer  who  proposed  to  exclude  one  of  the  three  names 
certified  to  him  and  thus  secure  the  certification  of  an  addi- 
tional name  to  show  that  the  person  objected  to  was  actually 
wholly  unfit.  In  practice,  however,  the  Commission  has  in- 
terpreted this  provision  liberally,  especially  in  connection  with 
positions  of  a  higher  grade,  and  has  ])crniited  appointing  offi- 
cers to  exclude  from  consideration  the  names  of  persons  who, 
while  in  no  wise  positively  unfit  for  the  positions,  have  been 
alleged  by  the  appointing  officer  to  be  lacking  in  peculiar 
qualifications  thought  to  be  necessary  for  the  position.     The 

^  Rule  XIV  refers  to  testimony  in  regard  to  matters  arising  under 
the  civil  service  act. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  431 

effect  of  tliis  practice  has  been,  in  substance,  to  grant  to  ap- 
pointing officers  in  these  cases  a  choice  from  the  first  four  or 
even  five  at  the  head  of  the  hst.  No  provision  is  made  for 
notifying  an  ehgible  of  the  exception  thus  taken  to  him  by  the 
appointing  officer. 

The  practice  in  question  presents  elements  of  danger,  since 
it  is  calculated  to  throw  suspicion  on  the  honesty  of  the  entire 
competitive  system.  In  an  examination  for  a  position  requir- 
ing peculiar  qualifications,  only  a  small  number  of  eligibles  is 
likely  to  have  been  secured  in  any  event,  so  that  the  allowance 
of  so  wide  a  discretion  to  the  appointing  officer  may  in  effect 
set  at  naught  the  relative  ratings  established  by  the  examina- 
tion and  tend  to  approximate  the  examination  to  a  mere  pass 
examination. 

The  rule  requires  that  in  any  case  selection  shall  be  made 
from  among  those  certified  or  on  the  register  "with  sole  refer- 
ence to  merit  and  fitness."  No  procedure  is  provided,  how- 
ever, by  which  the  decision  of  the  appointing  officer  to  pass 
over  the  first  or  the  first  two  names  certified  may  be  reviewed ; 
and  in  practice  this  provision  is  wholly  unenforceable.^  With 
reference  to  the  appointment  of  rural  carriers,  the  executive 
order  of  December  30,  191 1,  somewhat  elaborates  this  point. 
It  provides  that 

In  all  cases  selections  shall  be  made  with  sole  reference 
to  merit  and  fitness  and  without  regard  to  political  considera- 
tions. No  inquiry  shall  be  made  as  to  the  political  or  religious 
opinions  or  affiliations  of  any  eligible,  and  no  recommendation 
in  any  way  based  thereon  shall  be  received,  considered,  or 
filed  by  any  officer  concerned  in  making  selections  or  appoint- 
ments. Any  such  recommendations  in  writing  forwarded  to 
any  such  officer  shall  be  at  once  returned  to  the  writer  with 
attention  invited  to  the  purport  of  this  order,  and  attention 

*  Moreover,  the  rules  (Rule  I,  2)  prohibit  generally  any  discrimina- 
tion on  account  of  political  or  religious  reasons,  and  the  Commission 
may  investigate  a  selection  where  it  is  charged,  with  offer  of  proof,  that 
this  provision  of  the  rule  has  been  violated.  As  in  all  other  violations 
of  Ihe  rule  against  discrimination,  however,  the  Commission's  power 
goes  no  further  than  investigation,  and  so  far  as  the  particular  matter 
under  discussion  is  concerned,  this  provision  of  the  rules  is  virtually  a 
dead  letter. 


432  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

hereto  shall  be  similarly  directed  in  connection  with  any  verbal 
recommendations.  Where  it  is  found  that  there  has  been  a 
violation  of  these  provisions  by  any  officer  concerned  in  mak- 
ing selections  or  appointments,  such  fact  shall  be  cause  for  the 
immediate  removal  of  such  officer  from  the  service,  and  the 
commission  shall  make  prompt  report  of  any  such  case  for 
appropriate  action  to  the  Postmaster  General,  or,  as  to  presi- 
dential appointees,  to  the  President.  The  appointment  of  the 
rural  carrier  concerned,  if  effected,  shall  be  canceled.^ 

The  provision  allowing  the  appointing  officer  complete  dis- 
cretion in  the  selection  of  one  out  of  three  candidates  is  com- 
mon to  most  civil  service  systems.  The  theory  is,  of  course, 
that  in  view  of  the  mechanical  nature  of  the  ratings  established 
by  competitive  examination,  the  appointing  officer  should  be 
given  some  leeway  in  making  the  appointment.  With  reference 
to  positions  requiring  special  qualifications,  moreover,  it  is 
urged  that  where  the  examination  has  been  of  a  more  general 
character,  this  latitude  permits  him  to  select  from  among  those 
near  the  head  of  the  list  that  eligible  whose  qualifications  most 
nearly  approximate  the   special  qualifications  desired. 

The  practical  objection  to  this  practice  is  that  it  opens  the 
door  to  political  and  personal  influence  and  permits  of  pres- 
sure being  brought  to  bear  upon  the  appointing  officer  to  pass 
over  the  candidates  higher  on  the  list  in  favor  of  those  lower. 
To  ascertain  to  what  extent  such  political  influence  is  at  the 
present  time  a  factor  in  determining  the  selections  from  eligible 
lists  is  difficult.  In  all  probability  it  is  but  a  minor  factor  in 
appointments  to  positions  in  Washington,  because  the  candi- 
dates are  remote  from  the  seat  of  operations  and  have  usually 
little  facility  for  keeping  in  sufficiently  close  touch  with  de- 
velopments in  respect  to  the  lists  upon  which  their  names 
appear  to  permit  of  their  bringing  political  pressure  to  bear 
at  the  proper  time  or  upon  the  proper  appointing  officer.  In 
appointments  to  local  offices,  however,  the  situation  is  other- 
wise, and  it  is  notorious  that  here,  where  the  eligibles  on  the 
list  have  an  opportunity  to  keep  in  touch  with  vacancies  as 

*  TTiirty-fifth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1918),  p.  55. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS:  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  433 

they  occur,  political  or  personal  influence  is  frequently  brought 
to  bear  upon  the  local  appointing  officer  by  one  or  more  of 
the  three  eligible  candidates. 

A  rule  which  has  worked  well  in  some  local  commissions, 
is  that  the  eligible  highest  on  the  list  should  be  appointed, 
unless  reasons  are  given  satisfactory  to  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission why  the  appointment  of  a  lower  eligible  would  be  to 
the  interest  of  the  service.  There  is  nothing  mechanical  about 
this  rule.  It  does  not  compel  the  appointing  officer  to  appoint 
a  person  whom  he  deems  unsuitable,  but  it  requires  that  he  be 
willing  to  make  his  opinion  of  that  person  a  matter  of  record 
and  that  the  reasons  for  his  opinion  be  sufficiently  explicit  and 
well  founded  to  bring  conviction  to  an  impartial  critic  such 
as  the  Civil  Service  Commission.  Such  a  rule,  if  administered 
with  discretion  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  meets  every 
requirement  of  good  administration  and  yet  eliminates  almost 
completely  the  play  of  personal  and  political  factors.  It  is 
worthy  of  note  that  in  his  order  of  March  2,  19 17,  establishing 
a  system  of  competitive  examination  for  filling  certain  classes 
of  vacancies  in  presidential  postmasterships,  President  Wilson 
did  not  adopt  the  traditional  "one  in  three"  rule,  but  provided 
instead  that  the  Postmaster  General,  after  the  completion  of 
the  examination,  should  "submit  to  the  President  the  name  of 
the  highest  qualified  eligible  for  appointment  to  fill  such 
vacancy,  unless  it  is  established  that  the  character  or  residence 
of  such  applicant  disqualifies  him  for  appointment."  The  order 
does  not  make  clear  how  or  by  whom  it  is  to  be  "established" 
that  the  character  of  the  applicant  is  unsuitable,^  but  at  least 
the  principle  is  recognized  that  the  highest  eligible  on  the  list 
is  entitled  to  appointment  in  the  absence  of  positive  disqualifi- 
cation. 

The  extent  to  which  the  one  in  three  privilege,  even  in  these 
latter  days,  may  be  made  an  instrument  of  politics  was  in- 
dicated in  1913  by  a  statement  issued  by  the  Postmaster  Gen- 

*  In  practice  the  Post  Office  Department  has  assumed  the  right  to  pass 
over  the  highest  eHgible  as  unsuitable;  but  this  privilege  has  been  exercised 
in  but  few  cases. 


434  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

eral,  relative  to  the  policy  of  the  Post  Office  Department  in 
making  appointments  of  fourth  class  postmasters  and  of  rural 
carriers.  This  statement  was  called  for  at  this  time  because 
of  the  order  of  President  Wilson,  dated  ]\Iay  7,  191 3,  re- 
quiring that  all  fourth  class  postmasterships  be  filled  through 
open  competitive  examination  (as  against  the  orders  of  Presi- 
dent Taft,  dated  Noveml^er  30,  1908,  and  October  15,  1912, 
by  which  all  fourth  class  postmasters  then  in  the  service  who 
had  been  appointed  without  examination  were  "covered"  into 
the  service  and  the  competitive  method  applied  only  to  those 
who  might  be  appointed  subsequently).  The  Postmaster  Gen- 
eral said  :  ^ 

In  answering  an  inquiry  recently  as  to  what  influence  po- 
litical affiliations  would  have  in  fourth  class  postmaster  and 
rural  carrier  appointments,  Postmaster  General  Burleson  stated 
that  he  desired  it  distinctly  understood  that  it  is  his  purpose 
to  carry  out  the  intent  of  President  Wilson's  order  that  these 
positions  be  filled  in  accordance  with  both  the  spirit  and  letter 
of  the  civil  service  law.  The  Postmaster  General  added  that 
he  does  not  delegate  the  power  of  appointment,  nor  in  any 
case  is  selection  made  simply  upon  or  because  of  a  recom- 
mendation of  a  Member  of  Congress.  He  stated  further  that 
he  has  a  duty  to  perform  in  making  selections  under  the  civil 
service  rules ;  that  it  is  his  desire  to  select  in  every  case  the  most 
efficient  man  obtainable,  and  that  in  furtherance  of  such  de- 
sire he  is  using,  and  intends  to  continue  to  use,  every  available 
means  of  ascertaining  the  best  of  the  men  certified  to  him  by 
the  Civil  Service  Commission.  In  his  efforts  to  secure  the 
most  efficient  man  for  the  Postal  Service,  and  as  part  of  the 
evidence  upon  which  he  reaches  his  conclusion,  it  is  his  prac- 
tice to  ask  the  Member  of  Congress  in  whose  district  the  va- 
cancy exists  to  advise  him  relative  to  the  character  and  fitness 
of  the  three  eligibles.  In  doing  so  the  Postmaster  General 
calls  upon  the  Memljer,  not  in  his  capacity  as  a  member  of 
any  i)olitical  party,  but  solely  as  the  representative  of  the  com- 
munity, regardless  of  political  affiliations ;  and  to  emphasize 
his  purpose  in  this  respect,  the  Postmaster  General  in  asking 
the  Member  of  Congress  for  his  recommendation  calls  special 

^  Thirty-third  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 

(1916),    p.    XV. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  435 

attention  to  the  fact  that  under  existing  Executive  Orders  se- 
lections must  be  made  Ijy  the  department  with  sole  reference  to 
merit  and  fitness,  and  any  recommendation  made  to  him  must 
be  based  solely  upon  such  considerations  and  without  refer- 
ence to  the  political  affiliations  of  the  eligibles.  And  further 
he  has  directed  that  all  letters  recommending  appointments 
based  upon  political  considerations  be  returned  to  the  writers. 
The  Postmaster  General  states  that  he  is  in  earnest  in  his  ef- 
forts to  obtain  the  best  men  regardless  of  their  political  opin- 
ions, and  whenever  he  finds  in  any  case  that  he  has  been  misled 
because  of  recommendations  made  for  political  reasons,  the 
fourth  class  postmaster  or  rural  carrier  so  appointed  will  be 
promptly  removed  from  office. 

Following  are  his  directions  to  the  First  Assistant  Post- 
master General : 

In  selecting  persons  from  the  eligible  registers  furnished 
by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  for  appointment  as  fourth 
class  postmasters  it  is  my  desire  that  the  person  with  the  high- 
est rating  be  chosen,  unless  good  and  valid  reasons  are  sub- 
mitted to  the  department  showing  that  this  would  not  be  in 
the  best  interest  of  the  service.  If  reasons  are  submitted 
sufficient  to  make  the  selection  of  the  first  eligible  inadvisable, 
then  it  is  my  desire  that  the  person  with  the  next  highest  rat- 
ing be  chosen,  unless  good  and  valid  reasons  are  submitted  to 
show  the  inadvisability  of  his  appointment.  In  such  case  the 
third  eligible  may  be  selected.  In  no  case  should  the  second 
or  third  eligible  be  chosen  unless  the  appointment  of  one  of 
the  higher-standing  eligibles  has  been  shown  to  be  inadvisable 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  greatest  efficiency  in  the  Postal 
Service.  In  reaching  conclusions  as  to  the  most  desirable  ap- 
pointments an  endeavor  should  be  made  to  select  persons  whose 
business  and  temperamental  equipment  is  likely  to  reflect  credit 
on  the  Postal  Service. 

To  enter  into  a  discussion  of  the  spirit  in  which  this  order 
was  actually  carried  out  would  be  fruitless.  No  data  are  avail- 
able on  which  such  a  discussion  could  be  predicated  confidently 
and  the  unsuccessful  attempt  of  the  National  Civil  Service 
Reform  League  to  obtain  such  data  will  be  referred  to  in  an- 
other connection.      Statistics   published   by   the   Commission, 


436  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

designed  to  show  the  number  of  instances  in  which  the  first, 
second,  or  third  ehgible  was  appointed,  and  in  which  the  ex- 
isting incumbent  was  reappointed,  were  the  subject  of  dis- 
agreement even  among  the  members  of  the  Commission.^  It 
is  sufficient  here  to  point  out  that  the  exercise  in  this  way  of 
the  discretion  entrusted  to  tlie  appointing  officer  under  the 
one  in  three  rule  is  Ukely  to  result  in  the  entrance  of  political 
considerations  on  a  wide  scale. 

It  should  be  noted  that  under  the  regulations  promulgated 
to  carry  out  the  original  order  of  President  Roosevelt  in  1908, 
calling  for  the  competitive  selection  of  fourth  class  postmasters 
in  the  northeastern  section  of  the  country,  it  was  provided 
that  "the  person's  name  that  stands  at  the  head  of  the  register 
shall  be  selected  for  the  first  appointment,  the  next  highest 
for  the  next  appointment,  and  so  forth."  "  This  provision  of 
the  regulations  was  made  by  the  Commission  pursuant  to  an 
agreement  with  the  Post  Office  Department  which  waived 
the  right  granted  it  by  the  rules  to  have  three  names  certified 
to  it  for  each  vacancy.  When  the  competitive  system  was 
extended  by  President  Taft's  order  of  1912  to  the  fourth 
class  postmasters  over  the  country  as  a  whole,  this  provision 
of  the  regulations  was  not  retained  and  the  rule  requiring  three 
names  was  thus  restored  to  operation. 

In  the  selection  of  rural  carriers  the  same  developrnent  has 
taken  place.  Under  the  regulations  made  pursuant  to  the  orig- 
inal order  by  which  the  selection  of  rural  carriers  was  placed 
upon  a  competitive  basis — the  order  of  1902 — but  one  eligible 
was  certified  for  each  vacancy,  the  regulation  providing  that 
"the  person  whose  name  stands  at  the  head  of  the  register 
is  certified  to  the  Post  Office  Department  for  the  first  appoint- 
ment, the  next  highest  for  the  next  api)ointment,  etc."  ^     This 

^  The  figures  presented  by  llie  majority  of  the  Commission  appear 
on  pages  xvii  and  xviii.  Thirty-third  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil 
Service  Commission,  while  those  presented  by  the  dissenting  member  of 
the  Commission,  Commissioner  Craven,  appear  on  pages  xxv  and  xxvi. 

^Regulations  of  January  and  l'"ebruary,  I90<>,  Sec.  8,  Twenty-sixth 
Report  of  the  United   States   Civil   Service   Commission    (1909),  p.  25. 

'Twenty-first  kejjort  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1904),  p.  117- 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  437 

regulation  was  promulgated  by  the  Commission  under  an  agree- 
ment with  the  Postmaster  General  by  which  he,  as  appointing 
officer,  waived  the  right  secured  him  by  the  rules  of  having 
three  names  certified  to  him  for  each  vacancy.  Commenting 
on  this  feature  of  the  regulations  the  Commission  stated:^ 

It  is  recognized  that  it  is  possible  and  very  probable  that 
an  unsuitable  person  may  obtain  vouchers  which  appear  to  be 
proper,  may  file  an  application  which  meets  the  requirements 
of  the  regulations,  and  may  pass  an  examination  with  a  mark 
which  would  place  his  name  at  the  head  of  the  register  of 
eligibles.  As  a  safeguard  against  the  appointment  of  such  a 
person  the  following  provision  is  made : 

Whenever  five  or  more  patrons  of  a  rural  free  delivery 
route  submit  to  the  rural  carrier  examining  board,  in  writing 
over  their  own  signatures,  sworn  statements  that  an  appli- 
cant is  unsuitable  for  appointment,  giving  specific  reasons 
therefor,  each  of  the  heads  of  the  families  may  be  requested 
by  the  rural  carrier  examining  board  to  express  an  opinion 
as  to  the  fitness  of  such  applicant.  If,  upon  the  evidence  thus 
submitted,  it  is  shown  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  Commission 
that  the  applicant  is  not  suitable  for  appointment  his  name 
shall  be  stricken  from  the  register. 

In  this  way  the  service  is  protected  more  fully  than  if  a 
selection  should  be  made  from  among  the  three  highest,  as  in 
the  other  branches  of  the  service,  for  it  may  be  reasonably  pre- 
sumed that  the  patrons  of  a  rural  service  are  ever  watchful 
of  their  own  interest. 

By  an  executive  order  issued  December  30,  191 1,  the  Presi- 
dent ordered  that  this  provision  of  the  regulations  be  rescinded 
by  requiring  that  the  ordinary  provisions  of  the  civil  service 
rules  regarding  certification  should  apply  to  the  appointment 
of  rural  carriers,  and  that  three  eligibles  should  be  certified 
by  the  Civil  Service  Commission.  The  order  also  enjoined 
upon  the  Postmaster  General  selection  "with  sole  reference 
to  merit  and  fitness  and  without  regard  to  political  considera- 
tions." ^  Commenting  on  this  order  in  its  annual  report  the 
Commission  stated  that 

'  Ibid.,  p.  1 18. 

^Twenty-ninth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion   (1912),  p.   137. 


438  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Under  the  former  regulations  the  Department  was  not 
given  a  right  of  choice,  but  was  required  to  appoint  the  eHgible 
standing  highest  on  the  local  register.  It  became  evident 
that  some  latitude  should  be  allowed  in  the  selection  of  eligibles 
for  appointment  in  this  as  in  all  other  parts  of  the  service. 
There  are  few  branches  of  the  public  service  the  successful 
operation  of  which  is  so  dependent  on  the  personality  of  the 
employee.  The  greater  part  of  the  work  of  the  rural  carrier 
is  done  on  his  route  away  from  the  supervision  of  his  superior 
officer  and  not  in  full  view  of  the  public  as  in  the  case  of  the 
city  carrier.  He  is  brought  into  direct  contact  with  patrons 
and  their  families,  and  it  is  necessary  not  only  that  his  behavior 
should  make  him  worthy  of  their  confidence  but  that  his  char- 
acter and  disposition  should  be  such  as  to  inspire  it.  If  the 
patrons  lack  confidence  in  the  carrier,  it  will  show  itself  in  a 
diminution  in  the  patronage  of  the  route. 

In  view  of  these  reasons  the  President  in  an  order  of  De- 
cember 30,  191 1,  amended  the  rules  to  provide  that  three 
names  should  be  certified  for  each  vacancy.  To  guard  against 
possible  abuse  of  this  right  of  choice,  the  order  provides  that 
all  selections  shall  be  made  with  sole  reference  to  merit  and 
fitness  and  without  regard  to  political  considerations,  and  that 
political  recommendations  shall  not  be  considered  but  shall  be 
returned  to  the  writers.^ 


It  is,  perhaps,  fruitless  to  discuss  further  the  relative  merits 
of  the  two  positions  thus  taken  at  different  times  by  the  Com- 
mission. The  fact  that  the  method  of  certifying  the  highest 
eligible  apparently  gave  satisfaction  for  nearly  ten  years  (for 
there  is  no  indication  to  the  contrary  in  either  the  reports  of 
the  Commission  or  of  the  Post  Office  Department  prior  to 
19 1 2,  when  the  change  was  made)  gives  to  the  reasons  for 
the  change  thus  presented  by  the  Commission  in  19 12  some- 
thing of  the  character  of  an  original  discovery. 

In  connection  with  apportioned  positions  it  should  be  noted 
that  the  rule  permitting  the  appointing  officer  to  select  one  of 
the  three  on  the  eligible  register  may  work  in  precisely  the 
opposite  way  to  what  has  just  been  indicated;  that  is,  it  may 
enable  the  appointing  officer  to  select  a  person  actually  higher 

^  Ibid.,  p.  15. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  439 

on  the  register  in  terms  of  the  ratings  received  than  if  he 
were  compelled  to  select  the  first  name.  The  reason  is  that, 
owing  to  the  apportionment,  the  first  of  the  three  names  certi- 
fied may  be  that  of  a  candidate  receiving  a  lower  rating  than 
that  of  the  candidate  whose  name  appears  third,  but  who  comes 
from  a  state  more  in  arrears  in  its  quota  of  appointments. 
With  respect  to  this  class  of  positions,  therefore,  the  one  in 
three  rule  may  be  said  to  operate  in  the  interests  of  sound  per- 
sonnel administration. 

Similarly,  as  already  pointed  out,  the  one  in  three  rule 
offers  to  the  conscientious  administrative  officer  an  avenue  of 
escape  from  the  disastrous  results  of  the  military  preference 
statutes.  Despite  the  fact  that  these  statutes  call  for  preference 
in  "appointment,"  it  has  been  held  consistently  that  all  that 
is  required  is  preference  in  certification  to  appointing  officers, 
and  that  the  appointing  officer  is  free  to  pass  over  the  name 
of  the  veteran  if  he  so  chooses.  Although  the  mere  inclusion 
of  the  veteran's  name  among  the  three  certified,  rather  than  the 
name  of  one  higher  qualified  on  the  list,  in  itself  tends  to  reduce 
the  freedom  of  selection  of  the  conscientious  appointing  officer, 
the  situation  is,  of  course,  better  than  it  would  be  if  the  rule 
required  the  appointment  of  the  eligible  first  certified  in  every 
case. 

Another  factor  which  must  always  be  kept  in  mind  in 
thinking  of  the  relative  advantages  of  the  one  in  three  rule 
as  compared  with  the  selection  of  the  highest  eligible,  is  that 
the  former  sometimes  furnishes  a  welcome  relief  from  the 
mistakes  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  in  rating.  This  is 
particularly  likely  to  be  true  in  cases  where  the  ratings  of  the 
highest  competitors  are  close. 

To  sum  up,  the  question  of  the  degree  of  freedom  which 
the  appointing  officer  should  have  in  selecting  from  among 
those  declared  eligible  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  does 
not  admit  of  a  categorical  answer.  It  is  one  which  can  be 
answered  only  in  the  light  of  the  political  conditions  in  the 
service  involved.  The  question  arises,  therefore,  whether  in 
formulating  the  practice  in  respect  to  selections  from  the  elig- 


440  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

ible  list  account  might  be  taken  of  the  variations  in  the  moral 
or  pohtical  atmosphere.  In  those  branches  of  the  service 
which  are  technical  in  character,  and  in  which  the  head  of 
the  service  has  been  appointed  on  a  basis  of  merit  and  holds 
by  tradition  during  good  behavior  and  where  the  whole  tradi- 
tion of  the  service  is  one  of  efficiency  of  a  high  technical  stand- 
ard, it  would  doubtless  be  safe,  even  under  present  political 
conditions,  to  entrust  a  very  wide  margin  of  discretion  to  the 
appointing  officer.  On  the  other  hand,  in  those  services, 
particularly  in  local  establishments,  in  which  the  head  is  a 
political  appointee  holding  office  only  during  the  life  of  the 
administration  and  actively  engaged  in  the  work  of  political 
organization  even  while  holding  office,  little  discretion  can 
safely  be  permitted  under  the  theory  upon  which  the  present 
practice  is  predicated;  however,  any  recognition  of  variations 
in  the  degree  of  discretion  permitted  the  appointing  officer  from 
one  service  to  another  would  not  be  practicable.  In  general 
it  may  be  said  that,  were  the  direct  prohibition  against  political, 
and  particularly  Congressional,  interference  in  personnel  mat- 
ters made  effective,  and  were  the  merit  principle  extended  to 
embrace  all  the  administrative  posts  in  the  service,  the  discre- 
tion now  granted  appointing  officers  in  selection  from  among 
the  eligibles  would  be  much  less  open  to  question. 
Discretion  in  Fixing  of  Entrance  Compensation  Rates. — 
Under  present  practices  in  the  federal  service  the  appointing 
officer  possesses  a  large  discretion  in  fixing  the  entrance  rate 
of  compensation.  With  respect  to  a  great  number  of  posi- 
tions, particularly  in  the  technical  services,  as  stated  in  the 
chapter  dealing  with  compensation,  no  entrance  rates  are  pre- 
determined at  which  a  new  entrant  is  invariably  appointed. 
Instead  a  range,  sometimes  very  considerable,  is  provided,  and 
a  new  entrant  may  be  paid  at  any  rate  within  the  range  at  the 
discretion  of  the  appointing  department.  In  certain  examina- 
tions the  Civil  Service  Commission  has  announced  that  only 
those  receiving  the  higher  ratings  will  be  certified  for  the 
higher  rates,  but  ordinarily  the  practice  is  to  inquire  of  each 
candidate  the  minimum  salary  which  he  will  accept,  and  on 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  441 

receiving  a  request  from  a  department  or  office  for  a  certifica- 
tion to  fill  a  vacancy  at  a  specified  salary  to  certify  only  those 
who  have  stated  that  they  would  accept  a  rate  as  low  as  that 
offered.  This  practice  permits  the  appointing  officer,  desiring 
to  secure  a  particular  eligible  not  ordinarily  within  reach  for 
certification,  to  specify  an  entrance  salary  so  low  that  the 
higher  eligibles  will  not  be  certified.  He  thereby  secures  the 
appointment  of  the  eligible  sought;  and  within  a  comparatively 
short  time  he  may  advance  the  salary  of  the  new  appointee 
to  a  rate  considerably  higher  than  the  entrance  rate.  The 
new  rate,  if  originally  offered  for  entrance,  would  have  at- 
tracted the  persons  higher  on  the  register.  To  guard  against 
this  practice  the  civil  service  rules  provide  that  a  person  can- 
not be  promoted  within  the  probationary  period,  which  is 
ordinarily  six  months,  without  the  consent  of  the  Commis- 
sion, previously  obtained.  This  practice  may  be  guarded 
against  in  another  way  by  fixing  a  prescribed  rate  for  all  en- 
trants, and  establishing  fairly  rigid  rules  governing  early  pro- 
motion. This  method  is  applicable  to  a  great  number  of  rou- 
tine positions,  but  is  perhaps  not  sufficiently  flexible  to  meet  the 
requirements  of  the  technical  services.  For  those  services 
perhaps  the  better  method  is  to  prohibit  increasing  the  salary 
of  an  entrant  within  a  reasonable  period  after  appointment, 
unless  the  higher  rate  to  which  it  is  proposed  to  raise  him 
was  offered  and  declined  by  those  who  were  ahead  of  the  en- 
trant on  the  register. 

Publicity  of  Eligible  Registers. — Under  the  practice  of  the 
Commission  each  person  who  takes  an  examination  is  notified 
of  his  rating  in  it,  and  those  who  passed  are  advised  of  their 
position  on  the  register.  The  whole  register,  as  it  appears  on 
the  records  of  the  Commission,  is  not  made  public,  either 
through  publication,  as  is  the  practice  of  some  commissions,  or 
through  the  maintenance  of  a  copy  of  the  register  open  to  the 
public,  a  practice  almost  universal  among  civil  service  commis- 
sions. Where  a  civil  service  commission  maintains  a  register 
accessible  to  the  public,  it  is  also  usually  the  practice  to  enter 
Upon  this  register  a  note  of  all  certifications  of  any  names 


442  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

upon  the  register  and  all  appointments,  rejections,  declinations, 
and  so  forth,  made  on  the  basis  of  such  certifications. 

In  the  absence  of  the  use  of  any  of  these  procedures  by  the 
Civil  Service  Commission  it  is  impossible  for  any  competitor 
to  inform  himself  of  what  is  going  on  in  connection  with 
the  position  for  which  he  is  eligible,  except  by  making  direct 
inquiry.  He  is  not  even  advised,  under  the  practice  of  the 
Commission,  when  his  name  is  certified  to  an  appointing  officer, 
so  that  it  is  possible  for  him  to  be  certified  and  passed  over 
by  an  appointing  officer  without  his  being  aware  of  the  fact. 

This  total  absence  of  publicity  in  connection  with  the 
establishment  of  eligible  registers  and  of  certification  and  ap- 
pointment undoubtedly  constitutes  at  the  present  time  one  of 
the  weak  points  in  the  entire  system  of  recruitment  through 
competitive  examination.  It  is  not  intended  to  imply  that 
the  system  is  ordinarily,  or  indeed  aside  from  the  most  excep- 
tional cases,  actually  administered  with  other  than  scrupulous 
honesty,  but  the  impossibility  of  making  certain  of  this  by 
examination  of  the  Commission's  records,  leaves  open  the  door 
for  rumor  and  speculation  of  the  worst  sort. 

Whatever  reasons  of  convenience  may  be  advanced  against 
publication  of  the  eligible  registers,  or  against  permitting 
individual  eligibles  to  have  free  access  to  the  records  of  certifi- 
cations, appointments,  etc.,  it  is  difficult  to  see  why  such  records 
should  not  be  opened  to  the  representatives  of  recognized  or- 
ganizations, who  seek  access  to  them  for  a  public  service.  The 
Commission  was  thus,  for  many  years,  in  the  habit  of  open- 
ing such  records  to  the  representatives  of  the  National  Civil 
Service  Reform  League  in  recognition  of  the  interest  of  that 
association,  as  representing  the  public,  in  the  honest  and  im- 
partial execution  of  the  competitive  examination  system.  In 
1914,  however,  access  to  the  records  of  the  Commission  was 
denied  the  League  under  such  circumstances  as  to  warrant  the 
belief  that  the  denial  was  made  because  of  the  fear  that  in- 
spection of  the  records  would  have  disclosed  irregularities  in 
the  enforcement  of  the  law  and  rules,  or  at  least  would  have 
reflected   on   the    manner    in   which   the   administration   was 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  443 

exercising  its  legal  privilege  of  choice  from  among  the  names 
certified  to  it  by  the  Commission.  The  purpose  of  the  League, 
as  stated  in  its  formal  request  to  the  Commission,  was  to  ob- 
tain specific  information  concerning  fourth  class  postmasters 
under  President  Wilson's  order  of  May  13,  1913,  requiring 
competitive  examinations  to  be  held  for  all  fourth  class  offices 
whose  incumbents  had  not  been  appointed  as  a  result  of  com- 
petitive examination.  The  League  wished  to  ascertain  the 
number  of  candidates  who  took  part  in  the  examinations,  the 
names  of  the  successful  candidates  with  their  ratings,  the 
names  of  the  candidates  appointed  from  the  list,  and  whether 
the  previous  incumbents  of  the  offices  entered  the  examinations. 
The  reason  given  for  the  denial  of  the  League's  request  was 
that  it  was  necessary  "in  the  interest  of  the  public  business, 
owing  to  the  congestion  of  the  work  of  the  ofBce."  The  action 
of  the  Commission  was  sustained  by  President  Wilson,  who 
made  the  bland  suggestion  that  in  its  next  annual  report  the 
Commission  "disclose  the  method  employed  by  them  and  by 
the  Post  Ofiice  Department  in  administering  the  Executive 
Order  referred  to,  together  with  the  results  obtained  thereby."  ^ 
An  eligible  register  having  been  established  it  comes  into 
use  as  soon  as  a  department  head,  or  other  appointing  officer, 
makes  request  upon  the  Commission  for  the  names  of  eligibles 
for  the  filling  of  a  vacancy.     On  this  point  the  rules  provide : 

The  nominating  or  appointing  officer  shall  request  the  cer- 
tification of  eligibles,  and  the  commission  shall  certify,  from 
the  head  of  the  register  of  eligibles  appropriate  for  the  group 
in  which  the  position  or  positions  to  be  filled  are  classified,^  a 
number  of  names  sufficient  to  permit  the  nominating  or  ap- 
pointing officer  to  consider  three  names  in  connection  with  each 
vacancy.  When  so  provided  by  regulation  of  the  commission, 
selection  shall  be  made  from  the  register  by  the  nominating 
or  appointing  officer  without  preliminary  certification  of  the 
commission. 

The  provision  for  selection  by  the  appointing  officer,  di- 
rectly  from  the  register,  without  calling  for  certification,   is 

*  For  details  of  the  incident  see  Good  Government,  September.  IQ16. 
pp.  81-85. 


444  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

employed  only  in  connection  with  trades  positions  in  the  larger 
field  establishments — such  as  arsenals,  navy  yards,  etc. 
Probationary  Period. — The  civil  service  act  lays  down  as 
one  of  its  fundamental  provisions  to  be  incorporated  in  the 
rules,  "that  there  shall  be  a  period  of  probation  before  any 
absolute  appointment  for  employment."  Pursuant  to  this 
injunction  the  rules  provide : 

The  person  selected  for  appointment  shall  be  duly  notified 
by  the  appointing  officer,  and  upon  accepting  and  reporting  for 
duty  shall  receive  from  such  officer  a  certificate  of  appointment. 
The  first  six  months  under  this  appointment  shall  be  a  proba- 
tionary period;  but  the  commission  and  the  department  con- 
cerned may,  by  regulations,  fix  the  probationary  period  at  one 
year  for  any  specified  positions.^  If  and  when,  after  full  and 
fair  trial,  during  this  period,  the  conduct  or  capacity  of  the 
probationer  be  not  satisfactory  to  the  appointing  officer,  the 
probationer  shall  be  so  notified  in  writing,  with  a  full  state- 
ment of  reasons,  and  this  notice  shall  terminate  his  service. 
His  retention  in  the  service  beyond  the  probationary  period 
confirms  his  absolute  appointment.^ 

The  procedure  required  for  removal  during  the  proba- 
tionary period  under  this  rule  differs  from  that  prescribed 
for  removal  after  absolute  appointment,  in  that  in  the  latter 
case  the  employee  must  be  given  an  opportunity  to  answer, 
and  his  answers,  together  with  the  original  charges,  must  be 
made  of  the  record  in  the  department  and  in  the  Civil  Service 
Commission. 

The  provision  for  probationary  appointment  previous  to 
absolute  appointment  is  a  feature  of  virtually  all  public  per- 
sonnel systems  and  one  which,  if  properly  administered,  is  of 
high  value.  If  the  work  of  probationers  is  carefully  watched 
and  if  those  found  unsuitable  are  actually  removed,  the  effect 

'  "The  extension  of  the  probationary  period  to  one  year  has  been 
authorized  by  the  Commission  in  the  following  positions:"  Mining  engi- 
neers and  miners,  field  duty,  Bureau  of  Mines;  assistant  forest  rangers 
and  forest  assistants  in  the  field  Forest  Service ;  logging  engineers,  Agri- 
culture;  all  scientific  positions  in  the  Geological  Survey;  aid,  Lighthouse 
Service;  forest  rangers  and  grazing  assistants  in  the  Forest  Service. 

'  Thirty-fifth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1918),  p.  55. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  445 

is,  of  course,  extremely  beneficial.  It  is  questionable,  how- 
ever, whether  in  the  federal  service  at  present  this  institution 
is  functioning  to  any  marked  degree.  Appointing  officers  com- 
monly fail  to  exercise  the  power  thus  conferred  upon  them 
for  the  same  reasons  that  they  do  not  generally  exercise  their 
plenary  power  of  removing  permanent  employees  for  in- 
capacity or  misconduct.  At  this  point  it  may  be  pointed  out, 
however,  that  in  addition  to  other  general  factors  an  additional 
difficulty  arises  in  the  service  at  Washington  from  the  selec- 
tion of  the  subordinate  personnel  from  the  whole  area  of  the 
country.  An  appointing  officer  is  naturally  reluctant  to  dis- 
miss during  the  probationary  period  an  employee  who  has  but 
recently,  at  great  expense,  come  to  Washington  from  a  distant 
point  to  take  service  with  the  government. 

Making  the  probationary  period  effective  as  a  means  for 
weeding  out  of  the  service  at  the  outset  those  who  show  no 
promise  of  usefulness  is  one  of  the  most  difficult  problems  en- 
countered in  the  whole  field  of  public  personnel  administration, 
and  it  cannot  be  said  that  anything  approaching  a  satisfactory 
solution  has  yet  been  developed  anywhere.  On  this  point  the 
Reclassification  Commission  expressed  itself  as  follows : 

The  Commission  believes  that  a  more  thorough  and  ef- 
fective use  should  be  made  of  the  probationary  period,  and  that 
the  law  should  be  so  changed  that  probationary  appointments 
could  become  permanent  only  by  a  definite  administrative  de- 
cision. 

Recommendation    17    (b). — The   Commission    therefore 
recommends  that  administrative  officials  be  required  to 
submit  to  the  Civil  Service  Commission  such  reports  re- 
garding the  efficiency  of  probationary  appointees  as  the 
Commission  may  require,  and  that  no  permanent  appoint- 
ment be  made  except  on  certificate  by  the  Commission 
that  the  employee  has  satisfactorily  passed  his  probation- 
ary period. 
Under  this  provision  the  Civil  Service  Commission  might, 
for  example,  require  that  bi-monthly  reports  be  submitted  by 
the  head  of  the  department  or  other  organization,  during  the 
probationary  period,  certifying  as  to  the  efficiency  of  the  ap- 
pointee.    In  case  of  an  adverse  report,  the  Civil  Service  Com- 


446  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

mission  would  naturally  withhold  certification  of  permanent 
appointment.  No  probationary  appointee  would  then  be  per- 
mitted to  become  a  permanent  appointee  until  after  the  re- 
quired number  of  reports  had  been  made  upon  his  efficiency 
and  the  Civil  Service  Commission  had  issued  a  certificate  of 
permanent  appointment. 

These  precautions  would  force  upon  appointing  officers 
careful  inspection  of  the  work  of  probationary  appointees,  and 
would  safeguard  the  government  from  placing  upon  its  rolls 
permanently  those  who  had  failed  to  show  proper  ability  to  do 
the  work.  By  predicating  permanent  appointment  on  a  de- 
cision instead  of  an  omission,  the  probationary  period  would 
become  a  really  efifective  part  of  the  examination,  as  it  is  evi- 
dent the  law  intended  it  should  be.  It  should  not  be  over- 
looked that  the  merit  system  requires  the  exclusion  of  the 
unfit  fully  as  much  as  the  retention  of  the  fit,  and  that  the  re- 
moval of  the  unfit  during  the  probationary  period  works  less 
hardship  on  them  and  is  less  costly  to  the  government  than 
demotion  or  dismissal  after  they  have  received  permanent  ap- 
pointment.^ 

Although  in  certain  classes  of  positions,  even  six  months 
seems  to  have  been  found  too  short  a  period  for  the  proper 
appraisal  of  the  capacity  of  the  probationer,  it  is  believed  that 
for  the  ordinary  run  of  clerical,  sub-clerical,  or  even  routine 
technical  positions  it  is  too  long  a  period.  The  extension  of 
the  probationary  period  beyond  what  is  necessary  for  ap- 
praisal of  the  capacity  of  the  employee  is  undesirable,  because 
it  tends  to  encourage  the  appointing  officer  in  delaying  the  tak- 
ing of  positive  action  in  the  case  of  probationers  actually 
meriting  removal;  and  needless  to  say  the  longer  action  is 
delayed  the  harder  it  becomes.  It  would  seem  desirable,  there- 
fore, to  amend  the  rule  on  this  head  by  specifying  no  par- 
ticular period  of  probation,  but  authorizing  the  Commission  to 
fix  such  periods  by  separate  action  for  each  class  of  positions. 
Efficiency  of  the  Competitive  Examination  System. — 
When  the  competitive  examination  system  was  established  by 
Congress  35  years  ago  it  was  adopted  not  primarily,  or  perhaps 
even  incidentally,  with  the  thought  of  providing  a  system  in- 

*  Report,  Part  I,  p.  115. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  447 

herently  fitted  for  recruiting  the  personnel  of  the  government 
effectively  and  economically,  but  rather  as  a  means  of  com- 
batting the  evils  inherent  in  the  spoils  system.  As  the  merit 
principle  has  become  more  and  more  firmly  established,  the 
value  of  the  competitive  examination  system  as  a  check  against 
the  reintroduction  of  the  spoils  method  of  selection  has  come 
to  be  accepted  so  much  as  a  matter  of  course  that  interest 
has  come  to  center  rather  upon  the  question  of  the  actual  effi- 
ciency of  the  competitive  examination  system  as  a  method  of 
recruitment. 

The  methods  of  examination  have  been  developed  to  such 
an  extent  that  it  is  believed  that  the  competitive  examination 
system  now  furnishes,  on  the  whole,  as  effective  and  as 
economical  a  system  of  recruitment  as  can  well  be  devised  for 
the  government,  quite  regardless  of  the  necessity  of  excluding 
politic^.  More  and  more  large  industrial  and  commercial 
organizations,  as  is  commonly  known,  are  applying  formalized 
tests  in  recruiting  the  run  of  minor  employees,  and  as  to 
the  superior  personnel  the  methods  pursued  by  the  Commis- 
sion are  not  inherently  different  from  those  used  in  private 
practice. 

A  few  illustrations  of  the  efficiency  of  the  Commission  as 
a  recruiting  agency  may  be  cited  from  the  reports  of  the  Com- 
mission. 

The  facilities  the  Commission  has  at  hand  for  securing 
promptly  a  large  number  of  persons  qualified  along  special 
lines  have  been  well  illustrated  by  the  examination  for  in- 
spector of  meat  products  held  as  a  result  of  the  act  approved 
June  30,  1906.  In  the  course  of  the  debate  on  the  measure 
some  doubt  was  expressed  by  various  Members  of  Congress 
as  to  whether  the  Commission  would  be  able  to  secure  quali- 
fied inspectors  rapidly  enough  to  meet  the  needs  of  the  service. 
The  act,  however,  as  passed  did  not  take  the  positions  out  of 
the  competitive  classified  service,  and  results  have  demon- 
strated the  wisdom  of  this  course.  On  July  2  the  Department 
of  Agriculture  asked  the  Commission  to  hold  an  examination 
to  carry  out  the  provisions  of  the  law.  Twenty- four  hours 
thereafter  an  announcement  giving  the  scope,  times,  and  places 


448  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

of  the  examination  was  sent  to  the  press,  to  local  boards  of 
examiners,  and  to  various  institutions  through  whose  agency 
it  was  believed  that  competent  inspectors  could  be  secured. 
Applications  came  in  from  every  section  of  the  country,  and 
the  examination  was  held  on  July  21  at  about  200  places,  at 
which  2,496  persons  appeared,  795  of  whom  attained  eligible 
ratings.  On  July  28  the  first  certification  of  51  names  was 
sent  to  the  Department,  and  within  a  few  days  of  that  time 
all  the  papers  were  rated. 

Owing  to  the  heavy  demands  of  the  Department,  the  papers 
of  persons  receiving  ratings  of  65  per  cent  or  over  were  made 
eligible  and  as  a  result  of  this  action  825  selections  in  all  have 
been  made  from  the  registers  of  the  Commission.  This  of- 
fice has  been  informed  by  the  Department  of  Agriculture  that 
the  results  have  been  satisfactory.  A  considerable  number 
of  excellent  employees  has  been  secured,  and  an  extremely 
small  percentage  of  those  certified  has  turned  out  to  be  un- 
satisfactory. The  Commission  has  now  established  a  second 
register  and  is  prepared  to  meet  the  future  needs  of  the  serv- 
ice. It  is  not  JDelieved  to  have  been  possible  for  the  Depart- 
ment of  Agriculture,  with  the  machinery  at  its  disposal,  to 
itself  weed  out  of  the  large  number  of  applicants  those  not 
having  the  necessary  qualifications  for  the  position  in  anything 
like  the  time  actually  occupied  by  the  Commission  in  accom- 
plishing this  task.^ 

Another  illustration  is  furnished  by  the  work  of  the  Com- 
mission in  recruiting  the  valuation  force  of  the  Interstate 
Commerce  Commission :  ^ 

An  act  of  March  i,  19 13,  provided  for  the  physical  valua- 
tion of  railroads  by  the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission. 
The  Civil  Service  Commission  examined  competitively  for  this 
work  14,050  during  the  fiscal  year  1914  and  4,434  during 
191 5,  a  total  of  18,484.  About  6,500  eligibles  were  secured 
and  somewhat  more  than  1,200  have  been  appointed.  Forty- 
six  distinct  kinds  of  examination  were  held,  most  of  them  for 
technical  positions  of  the  highest  order.  Eighty-seven  ap- 
pointments were  made  at  $3,000  to  $4,800  per  annum. 

In  commenting  on  the   force  thus  assembled,  officials  of 

'  Twenty-third  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1906),  p.  3. 

*  Thirty-second  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion   (1915),  p.  8. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  449 

the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission  have  stated  that  through 
these  examinations  more  satisfactory  service  has  been  obtained 
than  could  have  been  secured  through  any  other  agency;  that 
the  men  appointed  are  of  the  highest  order  in  training  and 
abihty  and  are  exceptionally  efficient  in  the  performance  of 
their  duties.  The  men  engaged  in  the  physical  valuation  of 
railroads  constitute  one  of  the  most  remarkable  engineering 
forces  ever  assembled  and  their  selection  through  competitive 
examination  is  a  striking  illustration  of  the  efficiency  of  the 
merit  system  in  meeting  the  demands  of  the  public  service. 

Indeed  the  Chief  Examiner  of  the  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion has  related  that  "an  official  of  one  of  the  large  bureaus 
of  the  government  which  has  necessarily  close  relationship 
with  private  business  houses  has  expressed  himself  as  being 
better  satisfied  with  the  employees  secured  by  the  commission's 
methods,  for  even  the  highest  character  of  positions,  than  with 
those  he  secured  personally  when  occupying  an  official  posi- 
tion in  private  employment."  ^ 

Whatever  may  be  thought  of  this  high  praise,  it  is  cer- 
tain that  on  occasion  some  of  the  appointing  officers  who  have 
been  authorized  by  law  to  make  appointments  without  ref- 
erence to  the  civil  service  act,  have  called  upon  the  Commis- 
sion to  supply  them  with  eligibles.  Thus,  when  the  Federal  Re- 
serve Act  was  passed,  giving  the  Federal  Reserve  Board  author- 
ity to  appoint  all  its  employees  without  reference  to  the  civil 
service  act,  with  the  proviso  that  the  President  might  bring 
those  employees  under  the  act,  the  President,  in  response 
to  representations,  declined  to  do  so,  on  the  theory  that  the 
unrestricted  selection  by  the  Board  would  be  productive  of  a 
better  selection  and  that,  owing  to  the  high  caliber  of  the 
membership  of  the  Board,  there  was  no  danger  of  political 
selection  such  as  would  warrant  the  interposition  of  the  Civil 
Service  Commission.  Upon  the  organization  of  the  Board, 
however,  it  found  itself  besieged  with  so  many  applications 
for  appointment  that  it  called  upon  the  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion to  conduct  an  examination  for  the  purpose. 

^  Thirty-third  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1916),  p.  xxxiii. 


450  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Similarly  the  Department  of  Commerce  and  the  Interstate 
Commerce  Commission  have  called  upon  the  Commission  to 
recruit  by  examination  men  to  fill  the  positions  which,  under 
the  law,  might  have  been  filled  solely  by  the  discretion  of  the 
Department.  It  is  also  noteworthy  that  as  far  back  as  1905, 
when,  owing  to  the  difficulty  experienced  by  the  Commission 
in  securing  sufficient  eligibles  for  certain  classes  of  positions 
on  the  Isthmus  of  Panama,  it  was  at  one  time  suggested  that 
this  entire  branch  of  the  service  should  be  withdrawn  from 
classification,  "this  plan  was,  however,  opposed  by  the  Isthmian 
Canal  Commission  which  insisted  that  it  would  be  impossible 
to  carry  on  the  work  successfully  without  the  assistance  af- 
forded by  the  civil  service  law."  ^ 

Praise  of  the  efficiency  of  the  Commission's  administra- 
tion of  the  competitive  examination  system  as  a  whole,  how- 
ever, does  not  exclude  criticism  of  the  results  produced  at 
specific  points.  In  the  great  number  and  variety  of  examina- 
tions conducted  by  the  Commission,  it  is  inevitable  that  the 
eligible  registers  provided  for  a  proportion  of  positions  should 
be  less  satisfactory  than  would  be  the  selections  made  by  the 
honest  administrative  officer  in  the  exercise  of  his  unregulated 
discretion.  Particularly  is  this  likely  to  be  the  case  in  the 
technical  and  administrative  positions. 

The  provision  of  an  adequate  staff,  properly  compensated, 
would  make  it  possible  for  the  Commission  to  produce  better 
results,  in  all  but  a  negligible  proportion  of  cases,  than  the 
departments  themselves  possibly  could,  and  at  less  cost. 

In  appraising  the  efficiency  of  the  competitive  system  as 
administered  by  the  Commission,  the  influence  of  the  mili- 
tary preference  and  apportionment  rules  must  ever  be  kept  in 
mind.  These  rules  are  not  part  of  the  system;  on  the  contrary, 
to  the  extent  that  they  operate,  they  set  the  whole  system  at 
naught. 

The  Commission  as  a  recruiting  agency  was  subjected  to  a 
severe  test  by  the  war  emergency.    The  efficiency  with  which  it 

'Twenty-second  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission  (1905),  p.  19. 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  451 

met  the  tc^l  has  been  a  siiliject  of  some  discussion,  and,  in  any 
case,  must  be  a  matter  of  opinion.  It  would  seem,  however, 
that  the  work  of  tlie  Commission,  despite  exceptions  at  specific 
points,  was,  especially  in  view  of  the  moderate  cost  involved, 
excellently  administered,  and,  within  the  limitations  imposed 
by  the  nature  of  the  task,  constituted  a  contribution  of  the  high- 
est value  to  the  war  program.  The  Commission's  contribution 
would  have  been  far  greater,  it  is  believed,  had  the  President, 
at  the  outset  of  the  war,  adopted  the  policy  of  centralizing 
all  recruitment  in  the  Commission.  Some  of  the  most  im- 
portant war  agencies,  as  the  Food  Administration,  the  Fuel 
Administration,  the  Shipping  Board,  the  Council  of  National 
Defense,  the  Aircraft  Production  Board,  were  excepted  by 
the  President  from  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Commission,  with 
resulting  duplication  of  labor  and  improper  placement  of  per- 
sonnel. 

In  this  connection  the  following  from  the  report  for  19 18 
of  the  Chief  Examiner  of  the  Commission  is  of  interest:  ^ 

In  spite  of  the  magnitude  of  the  work  under  its  direction, 
there  is  no  criticism  heard  of  the  inspectors  employed  by  the 
Ordnance  Bureau  throughout  the  country.  That  bureau  had 
made  definite  specifications  (amended  from  time  to  time  as 
experience  justified)  covering  all  the  different  classes  of  in- 
spectors required ;  and  these  specifications  have  been  pub- 
lished by  the  commission  in  announcements  of  examinations, 
which  have  been  pending  since  practically  the  beginning  of  the 
war.  Another  bureau  has  been  severely  criticized  by  a  com- 
mittee of  Congress  for  the  incompetence  of  its  inspectors,  and 
for  its  wasteful  extravagance  in  the  employment  of  civilians; 
and  it  is  interesting  to  note  that  such  bureau  had  not  cooper- 
ated with  the  Commission,  had  fixed  no  standard  of  qualifica- 
tions, and  had  made  employments  of  all  kinds  indiscriminately 
without  reference  to  any  existing  civil  service  registers. 

It  need  hardly  be  added  that  what  has  been  here  said 
regarding  the  efficiency  of  the  competitive  examination  sys- 
tem operated  by  the  Commission  as  a  recruiting  mechanism 

^Thirty-fifth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1918),  p.  xxxi. 


452  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

has  reference  solely  to  that  mechanism  and  does  not  relate  to 
the  caliber  of  the  personnel  actually  recruited  through  it.  No 
system  of  recruiting  can  rise  above  its  source ;  that  is  to  say, 
it  cannot  select  for  the  service  any  higher  class  of  personnel 
than  is  attracted  to  the  service  by  the  conditions  there  obtain- 
ing. These  conditions,  whether  of  compensation,  security, 
opportunity  for  advancement,  or  the  like,  lie,  for  the  most 
part,  wholly  outside  the  sphere  of  the  Commission's  influ- 
ence; yet  it  is  within  the  limitations  set  by  them  that  the  Com- 
mission's recruiting  system  must  work. 

Reemployment  of  Employees  Laid  Off. — An  obvious  re- 
quirement of  a  proper  personnel  system  is  that  the  management 
should  do  its  utmost  to  find  employment  elsewhere  in  the 
service  whenever,  due  to  lack  of  work  or  other  causes,  it  is 
necessary  to  reduce  the  force.  Despite  the  obvious  character 
of  this  requirement,  its  recognition  in  the  federal  system  is  a 
recent  innovation  adopted  only  under  the  pressure  of  the  de- 
mobilization of  the  civilian  employees  of  the  government  upon 
the  close  of  the  war.  Prior  to  that  time  a  person  laid  off  for 
lack  of  work  was  no  longer  the  subject  of  any  interest  on 
the  part  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  or  any  other  central 
agency  of  the  government.  Should  a  vacanc>  occur  within 
the  same  department  within  a  year  after  such  layoff  and  the 
person  laid  off  should  be  fortunate  enough  to  hear  of  such 
vacancy  and  obtain  the  consent  of  the  appointing  officer  he 
might  be  reinstated  under  the  general  rule  governing  reinstate- 
ment ;  but  his  privileges  in  this  respect  are  no  greater  than 
those  enjoyed  by  persons  who  left  the  service  voluntarily. 

The  Executive  Order  of  Novenilier  29,  1918  (as  amended 
April  30,  1919),  by  which  the  obligation  of  the  government 
towards  those  laid  off  for  lack  of  work  was  for  the  first  time 
recognized,  is  as  follows : 

The  names  of  persons  in  the  competitive  classified  service 
with  unrestricted  status  who  were  appointed,  either  perma- 
nently or  probationally,  and  who  have  served  less  than  three 
years,  and  who  are  separated  from  the  service  because  of  a 
reduction  of  force,  and  who  are  recommended  for  further  em- 


RECRUITMENT  METHODS :  CLASSIFIED  SERVICE  453 

ployment  by  the  government  because  of  demonstrated  effi- 
ciency in  the  office  from  which  they  are  separated,  will,  upon 
request,  be  entered  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  upon  ap- 
propriate eligible  registers  for  reappointment,  eligibility 
thereon  to  continue  from  one  year  from  date  of  separation. 

Such  reemployment  registers  will  be  separate  and  apart 
from  the  registers  of  the  Commission  resulting  from  current 
examinations,  and  eligibility  thereon,  and  certifications  and 
appointments  therefrom,  shall  in  all  respects  conform  to  the 
usual  practice  and  procedure,  except  that  certifications  of  per- 
sons formerly  in  the  apportioned  service  shall  be  made  without 
regard  to  the  apportionment. 

The  Departments  in  making  requisition  on  the  Commission 
for  certification  of  eligibles  shall  state  whether  they  prefer 
certification  to  be  made  from  a  reemployment  register  or  from 
a  regular  register  of  the  Commission. 

It  is  desirable  that  the  Departments,  in  making  requisitions, 
request  certification  from  the  reemployment  registers  so  far 
as  practicable,  having  in  view  the  efficient  performance  of 
government  work. 

It  will  be  noted  that  the  order  allows  the  departments,  if 
they  so  desire,  to  appoint  from  the  regular  competitive  register 
instead  of  from  the  reemployment  register.  The  Reclassifica- 
tion Commission  has  urged,  however,  that  those  on  the  re- 
employment register  should  have  precedence  over  those  on  the 
regular  register,  and  even  over  those  in  the  service  who  might 
be  promoted  to  the  vacancies  "except  upon  showing  of  cause 
satisfactory  to  the  Civil  Service  Commission."  ^  In  principle 
this  recommendation  is  doubtless  correct,  but  if  put  into  effect 
it  would  be  desirable  that  the  Civil  Service  Commission  adopt 
a  very  liberal  policy  toward  the  administrative  officer  who  may 
seek  to  avoid  the  reemployment  register  in  a  given  case.  The 
danger  in  giving  too  mandatory  a  preference  to  those  on  re- 
employment registers  is  that  the  provision  of  such  registers  is 
not  infrequently  taken  advantage  of  by  administrative  officers 
to  rid  themselves  of  an  inefficient  employee  whom  they  lack 
the  courage  to  dismiss  out  of  hand. 

*  Report  of  the' Reclassification   Commission,   Part  I,   p.    128, 


CHAPTER  XII 

RECRUITMENT  METHODS:   THE  UNCLASSIFIED   SERVICE 

Of  the  five  formal  systems  of  recruitment  applied  outside 
the  regular  competitive  classified  service,  three,  those  applied  to 
commissioned  ofificers  of  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey,  presi- 
dential postmasters  and  laborers,  are  competitive;  and  two, 
those  applied  to  the  foreign  service  and  the  commissioned 
officers  of  the  Public  Health  Service,  are  non-competitive. 
Presidential  Postmasters^ — The  system  of  recruitment  of 
presidential  postmasters,  as  already  stated,  rests  wholly  on 
executive  order.  This  order,  which  was  issued  by  Presi- 
dent Wilson  on  March  31,  1917,  reads  as  follows:  " 

Hereafter,  when  a  vacancy  occurs  in  the  position  of  post- 
master of  any  office  of  the  first,  second,  or  third  class  as  the 
result  of  death,  resignation,  removal,  or,  on  the  recommenda- 
tion of  the  First  Assistant  Postmaster  General,  approved  by 
the  Postmaster  General,  to  the  elTect  that  the  efficiency  or 
needs  of  the  service  requires  that  a  change  shall  be  made,  the 
Postmaster  General  shall  certify  the  fact  to  the  Civil  Service 
Commission,  which  shall  forthwith  hold  an  open  competitive 
examination  to  test  the  fitness  of  applicants  to  fill  such  va- 
cancy; and,  when  such  examination  has  been  held  and  the 
papers  in  connection  therewith  have  been  rated,  the  said  com- 
mission shall  certify  the  result  thereof  to  the  Postmaster  Gen- 
eral, who  shall  submit  to  the  President  the  name  of  the  highest 
qualified  eligible  for  appointment  to  fill  such  vacancy  unless 
it  is  established  that  the  character  of  residence  of  such  appli- 
cant disqualifies  him  for  appointment.     No  person  who  has 

'  While  this  book  was  in  press  President  Harding  issued  a  new  Execu- 
tive Order  regarding  the  appointment  of  first,  second,  and  third  class 
postmasters,  and  the  Civil  Service  Commission  revised  somewhat  its 
scheme  of  examinations.  I'^or  tlie  text  of  the  now  order  and  for  a  brief 
discussion  of  it  and  the  revised  procedure  under  it,  see  footnote  begin- 
ning on  page  399. 

'Thirty-fourth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion (1917),  p.  119. 

454 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE 


455 


passed  his  sixty-fifth  birthday  shall  be  given  the  examination 
herein  provided  for.^ 

The  precise  character  of  this  action  should  be  clearly  under- 
stood. It  does  not  apply  to  vacancies  created  by  the  expira- 
tion of  the  four-year  statutory  term.  The  successful  candi- 
date in  the  open  competitive  examination  thus  has  before  him 
the  assurance  only  of  a  four-year  term ;  and,  during  those  four 
years,  he  does  not  enjoy  the  statutory  protection  against  re- 
moval accorded  those  in  the  classified  service." 

At  the  time  of  the  promulgation  of  the  order  the  number 
of  presidential  post  offices  was  as  follows : 


Class 

Compensation 

Number 

First    

$3,ooo-$8,ooo 

$2,000-$2,900 

$1,000-$  1, 900 

568 
2,207 

7,564 

Second    

Third     

10,339 

The  average  salary  was  approximately  $1,612, 

The  President's  order  fixes  no  requirement  respecting  resi- 
dence for  these  examinations,  but  merely  provides  by  implica- 
tion that  an  eligible  may  be  disqualified  because  of  residence. 
By  regulations,  however,  the  Commission  requires  that  the 
applicant  "must  actually  reside  within  the  delivery  of  the 
office  for  which  the  application  is  made."  ^    It  thus  perpetuated 

*  On  October  8,  1920,  after  this  manuscript  was  prepared,  President 
Wilson  amended  the  Executive  Order  of  March  31,  1921,  by  providing 
for  an  examination,  "if  such  vacancy  is  not  filled  by  nomination  of  some 
person  within  the  competitive  classified  civil  service  who  has  the  required 
qualifications,"  thereby  permitting  the  promotion  of  a  classified  employee 
to  a  postmastership  without  further  examination.  The  amended  Order 
also  prohibited  the  examination  of  a  person  ''who  has  not  actually  resided 
within  the  delivery  of  such  ofiice  for  two  years  next  preceding  such 
vacancy."  Thirty-seventh  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission (1920),  p.  97. 

^Comprising  a  prohibition  against  removal  "except  for  such  cause 
as  will  promote  the  efficiency  of  said  service,"  and  the  requirement  of 
charges  in  writing,  opportunity  for  answer,  and  the  like. 

^  It  is  also  provided  that  he  "must  have  so  resided  at  the  time  the 
vacancy  occurred,"  this  restriction  being  manifestly  designed  to  prevent 
the  evasion  of  the  residence  requirement  by  a  removal  into  the  delivery 
area  after  the  vacancy  occurs.  After  this  discussion  was  written  Presi- 
dent Wilson  amended  the  Order  of  March  31,  1917,  as  indicated  in  a 
preceding  footnote,  and   wrote  the  residence  requirement  into  the  Order. 


4S6  THE  FEDERAL  SERMCE 

the  old  tradition  that,  without  any  legal  requirement,  had 
always  governed.  This  tradition,  it  will  be  recalled,  was  also 
observed  when  the  system  of  competitive  examination  was  ex- 
tended to  the  fourth  class  postmasterships,  but  in  that  case 
opening  the  competition  to  persons  not  resident  in  the  dis- 
trict would  have  been  of  little  avail  in  getting  better  candidates 
because  the  duties  of  the  fourth  class  postmasters  must  almost 
invariably  be  performed  in  conjunction  with  some  local  busi- 
ness. 

To  estimate  the  effect  of  this  residence  requirement  upon 
the  quality  of  the  competitors  is  difficult.  In  the  less  important 
offices,  it  is  probably  not  serious.  In  the  larger  offices  it  bars 
from  the  competition  postal  employees  who  hold  positions  of 
advanced  responsibility  in  other  post  offices,  which  may  be 
larger  perhaps  than  the  office  in  w^hich  the  vacancy  in  the  post- 
mastership  occurs.  Free  movement  of  experienced  adminis- 
trative employees  from  one  post  office  to  another  is,  as  already 
pointed  out,  in  the  highest  degree  desirable,  and  it  is  believed 
that  the  time  has  come  to  abandon  or  materially  liberalize  the 
residence  requirement  for  postmasterships,  with  respect  to  em- 
ployees already  in  the  postal  service. 

The  examination  system  devised  by  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission to  carry  out  the  order  establishes  two  distinct  types 
of  examination :  ( i )  for  offices  having  an  annual  compensa- 
tion from  $i,ooo  to  $2,400,  a  combination  of  an  assembled 
written  test  and  a  non-assembled  experience  test;  and  (2)  for 
offices  having  an  annual  compensation  above  $2,400,  a  non- 
assembled  education  and  experience  test. 

For  the  offices  having  annual  compensation  of  from  $1,000 
to  $2,400,  applicants  are  examined  on  arithmetic,  penmanship, 
and  letterwriting,  which  are  given  a  weight  of  65,  and  the  re- 
maining 35  weights  out  of  the  total  of  100  are  given  to  ex- 
perience and  business  training.  In  the  examination  for  offices 
having  an  annual  compensation  above  $2,400  education  has  a 
weight  of  20,  and  business  training  and  experience  a  weight  of 
80  per  cent. 

No  indication  is  given  by  the  Commission  of  the  basis  upon 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE  457 

which  the  rating  on  experience  is  determined  in  the  examina- 
tions for  offices  having  a  compensation  of  $2,400  or  less;  but, 
if  the  statements  made  by  it  with  respect  to  the  rating  of  ex- 
perience for  examinations  for  offices  having  compensation 
above  $2,400  may  be  accepted  as  a  guide,  the  experience  con- 
sidered desirable  is  that  gained  in  executive  positions  in  busi- 
ness, and  no  special  weight  is  attached  to  experience  in  the 
postal  business.  In  establishing  standards  of  experience  for 
offices  paying  more  than  $2,400,  the  Commission  differentiates 
between  different  sizes  of  offices  according  as  their  pay  is  (i) 
from  $2,400  to  $4,000;  (2)  from  $4,000  to  $6,000;  and  (3) 
over  $6,000.  For  the  lowest  class  "applicants  must  show 
that  for  at  least  three  years  they  have  held  responsible  posi- 
tions in  which  their  principal  duties  involved  the  management 
of  business  affairs  and  the  direction  and  supervision  of  em- 
ployees, including  such  positions  in  the  different  branches  of 
the  postal  service."  For  offices  paying  from  $4,000  to  $6,000 
the  requirement  is  for  at  least  five  years'  experience  as  "presi- 
dent, general  manager,  general  superintendent,  or  assistant 
general  superintendent  requiring  the  active  charge  of  firms, 
corporations,  or  offices,"  and  for  offices  paying  more  than 
$6,000  a  year,  seven  years  of  such  experience.^ 

In  none  of  these  statements  of  requirements  is  any  special 
importance  or  value  attached  to  experience  in  the  postal  serv- 
ice as  opposed  to  experience  in  private  business.  If  anything, 
greater  value  is  apparently  attached  to  business  than  to  postal 
experience.  This  is,  of  course,  in  harmony  with  the  whole 
tenor  of  the  order  establishing  a  system  of  open  competition 
rather  than  one  of  promotion,  and  the  Commission  is,  there- 
fore, perhaps  not  to  be  criticized  for  carrying  out  the  intent 
of  the  order.  Nevertheless,  it  would  seem  that,  even  within 
those  limitations,  the  Commission  might  well,  in  its  published 
announcements,  encourage  the  competition  of  members  of  the 

^  There  are  also  age  requirements  graded  according  to  the  class  of 
the  post  office.  For  offices  of  the  first  class  the  minimum  age  is  30  and 
for  those  of  the  second  class  the  minimum  age  is  25  years.  (Third 
class  offices  fall  wholly  in  the  class  of  those  having  annual  compensation 
of  from  $1,000  to  $2,400.)  The  maximum  age  is  65  years  for  both 
classes. 


458  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

postal  service  by  placing  much  more  emphasis  than  it  now 
does  upon  the  desirability  of  postal  experience.  In  connection 
with  the  smaller  offices  this  could  hardly  be  done,  of  course, 
without  changing  the  requirements  of  the  regulations  to  the 
efifect  that  the  applicant  "must  actually  reside  within  the  de- 
livery of  the  office  for  which  the  application  is  made,"  since 
the  only  postal  employees  so  resident  might  have  had  alto- 
gether too  little  experience  to  warrant  their  serious  considera- 
tion for  the  postmastership.  It  is  impossible  to  state  to  what 
extent  the  Commission,  in  its  rating,  is  actually  giving  credit 
for  postal  experience.  It  is  believed,  however,  that  the  actual 
rating  substantially  accords  with  the  policy  thus  apparently  im- 
plied in  the  statement  of  requirements,  and  that  a  postal  em- 
ployee who  makes  application  for  a  presidential  postmastership 
finds  his  postal  experience  receives  little,  if  any  more,  con- 
sideration, and  perhaps,  in  some  cases,  not  as  much  as  the 
experience  gained  in  wholly  remote  lines  of  business. 

With  respect  to  the  evidence  used  in  rating,  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  states  that  in  the  examination  for  offices 
having  an  annual  compensation  of  $2,400  or  less  "the  sub- 
ject of  business  training  and  experience  is  rated  on  the  appli- 
cants' statements  in  their  applications  and  corrol)orative  evi- 
dence" and  it  makes  the  same  announcement  with  respect  to 
the  rating  on  "education"  in  the  examination  for  offices  hav- 
ing compensation  above  $2,400.  In  the  latter  examination, 
however,  the  rating  on  "business  training  and  experience" 
is  based,  not  only  upon  the  statements  of  the  candidate,  but 
upon  "a  careful  personal  investigation  of  each  applicant  by 
representatives  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  one  of  whom 
is  to  be  selected  by  the  Commission  from  the  Post  Office  De- 
partment, such  representatives  to  make  report  of  their  inves- 
tigation direct  to  the  Commission."  The  investigation  on 
this  head  is  to  consist  of  a  "careful  personal  inquiry  from  per- 
sons best  qualified  to  know  of  the  business  qualifications,  abil- 
ity, and  experience  of  each  candidate,  the  report  of  such  in- 
quiry to  be  confined  to  the  findings  of  facts  and  to  be  made 
part  of  the  evidence  and  report  upon  which  the  Commission 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE  459 

rates  the  candidate."  At  the  same  time,  the  representatives 
are  to  make  inquiry  "as  to  each  candidate's  suitabiHty  for  the 
office  by  reason  of  his  character  and  personal  characteristics, 
this  part  of  the  inquiry  to  be  non-competitive  and  not  to  be 
considered  in  the  rating  of  the  candidate,  but  if  he  is  found 
unsuitable  by  the  Commission,  as  a  result  of  such  inquiry,  he, 
of  course,  will  not  be  declared  eligible." 

The  President's  order  governing  the  appointment  of  presi- 
dential postmasters  goes  further  than  do  the  civil  service  rules 
in  the  influence  allotted  to  the  examination  in  determining  se- 
lection. Under  the  rules  of  the  regular  competitive  system, 
three  names  are  certified  to  the  appointing  officer  for  each 
vacancy  and  his  selection  from  among  those  names  is  in  no 
way  controlled.  The  President's  order,  on  the  other  hand, 
requires  that  when  the  "examination  has  been  held  and  the 
papers  in  connection  therewith  have  been  rated,  the  said  Com- 
mission shall  certify  the  result  thereof  to  the  Postmaster  Gen- 
eral, who  shall  submit  to  the  President  the  name  of  the  high- 
est qualified  eligible  for  appointment  to  fill  such  vacancy,  un- 
less it  is  established  that  the  character  or  residence  of  such 
applicant  disqualifies  him  for  appointment." 

Rumors  have  been  current  in  recent  months  that  the  Post 
Office  Department  was  urging  the  President  to  amend  the  rule 
so  as  to  permit  the  department  to  send  him  the  name  of  any 
one  of  the  highest  three  as  in  the  classified  competitive  serv- 
ice. What  has  been  said  regarding  the  merits  of  that  prac- 
tice in  connection  with  the  regular  competitive  system  applies 
here  and  need  not  be  repeated.  The  officers  of  the  National 
Civil  Service  Reform  League,  although  they  had  never  taken 
any  strong  ground  in  opposition  to  the  practice  of  certifying 
three  names  for  each  vacancy  in  the  regular  competitive  sys- 
tem, wrote  to  the  President  opposing  the  introduction  of  the 
one  in  three  rule  in  the  case  of  presidential  postmasters.  They 
said :  ^ 

In  the  promulgation  of  the  order,  the  President  stood  on 
high  ground  which  will  not,  we  venture  to  suggest,  be  under- 

^  Good  Government,  vol.  36,  p.  157. 


46o  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

mined  by  those  members  of  Congress  who  seek  a  partial  re- 
turn to  the  patronage  system.  In  providing  as  you  did,  for 
the  appointment  of  the  first  person  unless  it  is  established  that 
the  character  or  residence  disqualifies  him  from  appointment, 
you  reduced  substantially  the  pressure  exerted  by  office  seek- 
ers upon  the  executive  branch  of  the  government.  A  return 
to  the  rule  of  three  would  be  interpreted  as  an  invitation  to 
friends  of  eligibles  to  attempt  to  influence  the  appointment. 

The  suggestion  that  some  latitude  might  properly  be  al- 
lowed the  department  when  the  differences  in  the  ratings  are 
very  slight  would  seem  to  have  special  application  to  the  ex- 
amination provided  for  postmasterships  paying  under  $2,400. 
Here  the  rating  on  experience  has  a  weight  of  35  out  of  100 
in  a  final  average  in  which,  by  a  mathematical  computation, 
the  rating  on  experience  is  combined  with  the  ratings  in  the 
written  tests.  Relative  ratings  produced  by  such  a  mathe- 
matical combination  are  notoriously  unreliable  as  means  of 
determining  the  relative  merits  of  candidates  whose  final  aver- 
ages dififer  but  little. 

The  President's  order  does  not  state  who  shall  determine 
whether  the  character  or  residence  of  the  applicant  disquali- 
fies him  for  appointment.  It  appears  ^  that,  in  practice,  when 
the  department,  on  making  investigation,^  has  taken  exception 
to  the  character  or  residence  of  the  highest  eligible,  it  has 
called  the  matter  to  the  attention  of  the  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion and  requested  it  to  re-rate  the  examination.  In  some 
cases  the  Commission  has  complied  but  in  others  it  has  de- 

*  Hearing  before  the  subcommittee  of  the  Committee  on  Post  Offices 
and  Post  Roads,  United  States  Senate,  Sixty-sixth  Congress,  First  Ses- 
sion, on  the  nomination  of  Robert  T.  Wade  for  postmaster  at  Morehead 
City,  N.  C,  p.  90. 

'  The  department,  however,  has  not  relied  solely  on  its  own  inves- 
tigation but  has  permitted  any  member  of  Congress  to  examine,  for  his 
"confidential"  information,  the  eligible  register  transmitted  to  it  by  the 
Civil  Service  Commission.  (Hearings,  p.  81.)  This  would  seem  a  wholly 
unnecessary,  if  not  improper,  procedure,  particularly  as  the  eligible  him- 
self is  not  even  advised  of  his  relative  standing  on  tlie  list.  The  re- 
sponsibility of  the  department  under  the  order  would  be  discharged,  and 
all  proper  interest  of  the  Congressman  met,  by  advising  the  Congress- 
man of  the  name  of  the  highest  eligible  and  requesting  advice  of  any 
facts  regarding  the  "character  or  residence"  of  that  eligible  which  might 
tend  to  disqualify  him  for  appointment. 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE  461 

clined.  In  the  latter  cases  the  department  has  generally  ac- 
quiesced, but  in  a  few  instances  it  has  certified  to  the  Presi- 
dent the  name  of  the  next  highest  eligible,  taking  the  position 
that  the  power  of  "establishing"  that  the  character  or  resi- 
dence of  the  eligible  disqualifies  him  for  appointment  rests  with 
the  department ;  and  in  this  the  Commission  has  acquiesced. 

Examination  of  the  records  of  the  department  made  in 
September,  1919,  showed  that,  out  of  a  total  of  1,267  appoint- 
ments made  under  the  order,  the  first  eligible  has  been  nomi- 
nated in  1,188  cases,  or  93.7  per  cent  of  the  total;  or,  if  the 
cases  in  which  the  death  or  declination  of  the  first  eligible 
necessitated  the  selection  of  the  next  available  eligible  be 
added,  in  1,214  cases,  or  95.7  per  cent  of  the  total.  In  the 
remaining  53  cases  the  first  eligible  was  rejected,  in  35  cases 
because  of  character  or  residence,  and  in  18  cases  because  of 
ill  health. 

An  executive  order  issued  April  13,  1920,  extends  to  presi- 
dential postmasterships  the  principle  of  military  preference  en- 
acted by  Congress  for  all  non-presidential  positions,  but  in  a 
much  more  limited  form.     The  order  provides: 

The  Veteran  Preference  Statutes  shall  apply  in  the  selec- 
tion of  persons  for  appointment  as  postmaster  at  offices  of  the 
first,  second,  and  third  class.  When  the  highest  eligible  cer- 
tified to  the  Postmaster  General  by  the  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion is  not  a  veteran  but  a  veteran  is  among  those  certified  as 
eligible,  the  Postmaster  General  may  submit  to  the  President 
for  nomination  the  name  of  either  the  highest  eligible  or  the 
veteran  obtaining  the  highest  eligible  rating  as  the  best  inter- 
ests of  the  service  may  require. 

Although  the  order  thus  provides  that  the  "veteran  prefer- 
ence statutes"  shall  apply,  the  context  makes  clear  that  the 
preference  is  to  be  extended  only  to  the  veteran  himself,  and 
not  to  his  wife  or  widow,  as  provided  by  the  Statutes. 

When  the  department  has  certified  a  name  to  the  Presi- 
dent, that  name  has  invariably  been  sent  to  the  Senate;  at 
least,  no  instance  has  come  to  light  in  which  the  friends  of 
any  candidate  have  attempted  to  intervene  at  this  stage  of  the 


462  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

procedure.  In  the  Senate  the  nomination  is  considered  by 
the  Committee  on  Post  Offices  and  Post  Roads,  and  only  in 
one  or  two  cases  in  which  some  special  question  has  been  raised 
as  to  the  propriety  of  the  examining  procedure  has  that  com- 
mittee failed  to  confirm  the  nomination,  virtually  without  in- 
vestigation. Up  to  the  present  time  the  requirement  of  con- 
firmation by  the  Senate  cannot  be  said,  therefore,  to  haVe 
been  in  any  degree  inimical  to  the  competitive  or  merit  prin- 
ciple in  the  selection  of  presidential  postmasters. 

The  proved  efficiency  of  the  methods  employed  by  the 
Commission  in  recruitment  for  the  ordinary  grades  in  the  com- 
petitive classified  service  makes  it  reasonable  to  assume,  almost 
without  investigation,  that  those  methods  have  produced  simi- 
larly satisfactory  results  here,  and  there  is  no  reason  to  ques- 
tion this  assumption.^  With  respect  to  the  more  important 
postmasterships,  however,  the  application  of  competitive  ex- 
amination methods  by  the  Commission  presents  almost  a  dis- 
tinct novelty.  The  position  of  postmaster  at  Boston,  for  ex- 
ample, for  which  the  Commission  recently  held  examination, 
carries  a  salary  of  $8,000,  a  salary  double  the  highest  salaries 
for  any  positions  in  the  classified  competitive  service  to  which 
the  Commission  had  previously  applied  the  method  of  com- 
petitive examination  (except  in  a  few  special  instances).  From 
the  evidence  thus  far  available,  however,  there  is  no  reason 
to  believe  that  the  results  of  the  examinations  as  applied  to 
these  higher  offices  has  been  other  than  satisfactory.  This 
is  not  to  say  that  in  all  cases  opinion  has  been  unanimous  in 
the  city  concerned  that  the  best  candidate  has  been  selected; 
but  no  instance  has  come  to  attention  in  which  public  dissat- 

^  The  only  case  in  which  there  has  been  any  airing  on  the  qualifica- 
tions of  the  candidates  was  that  of  the  postinastcrship  at  Morehead,  N.  C, 
which  was  the  subject  of  investigation  by  the  Senate  Committee  on  Post 
Office  and  Post  Roads  in  1919.  In  this  case  it  was  admitted  by  the  wit- 
nesses that  both  candidates  on  the  eligible  register  were  well  qualified 
for  the  position,  the  question  at  issue  being  merely  whether  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  had  acted  properly  in  revising  the  ratings  at  the 
instance  of  the  Post  Office  Department  so  as  to  reverse  the  position  of 
the  two  candidates  on  the  eligible  register  (see  Hearings  Before  the  Sub- 
committee of  the  Committee  on  Post  Offices  and  Post  Roads,  United 
States  Senate,  Sixty-sixth  Congress,  first  session,  on  the  nomination  of 
Robert  T.  Wade  as  postmaster  at  Morehead,  N.  C). 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE  463 

is  faction  has  been  expressed  with  the  selection  or  the  opinion 
voiced  that  the  appointee  was  not  quahfied  for  the  post.^ 

'  It  has  been  stated  that  the  results  of  tlie  examination  for  the  post- 
mastership  at  Worcester,  Massachusetts,  a  $6,000  position,  perhaps  the 
first  important  postmastership  to  be  filled  under  the  order,  was  emi- 
nently satisfactory,     (See  Good  Government,  January,  1918,  vol;  35,  page 

On  May  10,  1921,  President  Harding  issued  a  new  Executive  Order 
governing  the  appointment  of  first,  second,  and  third  class  postmasters, 
which  was  subsequently  slightly  modified  to  make  the  two  years'  residence 
requirement  relate  to  the  date  of  the  examination  instead  of  to  the  date 
of  the  vacancy  for  which  the  examination  is  held.  The  Order  as  revised 
reads  as  follows : 

"When  a  vacancy  exists  or  hereafter  occurs  in  the  position  of  post- 
master at  an  office  of  the  first,  second,  or  third  class,  if  such  vacancy  is 
not  filled  by  nomination  of  some  person  within  the  competitive  classified 
civil  service  who  has  the  required  qualifications,  then  the  Postmaster 
General  shall  certify  the  fact  to  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  which  shall 
forthwith  hold  an  open  competitive  examination  to  test  the  fitness  of 
applicants  to  fill  such  vacancy,  and  when  such  examination  has  been  held 
and  the  papers  in  connection  therewith  have  been  rated,  the  said  commis- 
sion shall  certify  the  results  thereof  to  the  Postmaster  General,  who  shall 
submit  to  the  President  the  name  of  one  of  the  highest  three  qualified 
eligibles  for  appointment  to  fill  such  vacancy  unless  it  is  established  that 
the  character  of  residence  of  any  such  applicant  disqualifies  him  for 
appointment :  Provided,  That  at  the  expiration  of  the  term  of  any  person 
appointed  to  such  position  through  examination  before  the  Civil  Service 
Commission,  the  Postmaster  General  may.  in  his  discretion,  submit  the 
name  of  such  person  to  the  President  for  renomination  without  further 
examination. 

"No  person  who  has  passed  his  sixty-fifth  birthday,  or  who  has  not 
actually  resided  within  the  delivery  of  such  office  for  two  years  next  pre- 
ceding the  date  of  examination,  shall  be  given  the  examination  herein 
provided  for. 

"If,  under  this  order,  it  is  desired  to  make  nomination  for  any  office 
of  a  person  in  the  competitive  classified  service,  such  person  must  first  be 
found  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  to  meet  the  minimum  requirements 
for  the  office." 

This  Order,  it  will  be  noted,  applies  to  vacancies  created  by  the  ex- 
piration of  the  four-year  statutory  term,  but  it  gives  the  successful  candi- 
date in  the  open  competitive  examination  the  assurance  only  of  a  four-year 
term.  Although  it  permits  the  Postmaster  General,  in  his  discretion  to 
submit  for  renomination  without  further  examination  the  name  of  the 
postmaster  originally  appointed  by  examination,  it  does  not  require  him 
to  do  so  if  the  services  of  the  postmaster  have  been  satisfactory.  A 
successful  postmaster  of  the  opposite  political  faith  from  the  administra- 
tion might  find  himself  required  to  take  a  new  competitive  examination. 

Under  the  new  Order,  moreover,  he  might  fail  of  reappointment  even 
should  he  stand  head  and  shoulders  above  his  two  nearest  competitors  in 
the  new  examination,  because  the  new  rule  gives  to  the  Postmaster  General 
the  right  to  select  from  among  the  three  highest  eligibles. 

The  ^ew  Order  preserves  the  residence  requirement  which  by  amend- 
ment was  written  into  President  Wilson's  Order  of  March  31,  1917.  All 
that  was  said  in  the  original  text  against  this  requirement  applies  with 
equal  force  against  the  new  Order. 

Under  the  new  Order  assembled  written  examinations  are  held  for 
third-class  postmasterships.  which  pay  from  $1,000  to  $2,200.     The  sub- 


464  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey. — The  law  governing  the 
appointment  of  commissioned  officers  in  the  Coast  and  Geodetic 
Survey,  who  comprise  the  unclassified  personnel,  does  not 
provide  for  a  competitive  examination  when  entering  the  ser- 
vice, merely  stipulating  that  no  person  shall  be  appointed  aid, 
the  lowest  rank,  or  promoted  "until  after  passing  a  satisfactory 
mental  and  physical  examination  conducted  in  accordance  with 
regulations  prescribed  by  the  Secretary  of  Commerce."  ^     The 

jects  and  weights  in  this  examination  are  as  follows,  according  to  the 
circular  (Form  2223)  issued  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  in  July, 
1921 : 

Subjects  Weights 

1.  Business  training,  experience  and  fitness   (under  this  subject, 

full  and  careful  consideration  is  given  to  the  candidate's 
business  training  and  experience.^  The  rating  is  based 
upon  the  candidate's  sworn  statements  of  his  personal  his- 
tory, as  verified  after  inquiry  by  the  Commission.  It  must 
be  clearly  shown  that  the  candidate  has  demonstrated 
ability  in  meeting  and  dealing  satisfactorily  with  the 
public) SO 

2.  Accounts  and  arithmetic  (tliis  test  includes  a  simple  statement 

of  a  postmaster's  monthly  money-order  account  in  a  pre- 
pared form,  furnished  tlie  candidate  in  the  examination, 
and  a  few  problems  comprising  addition,  subtraction, 
multiplication,  division,  percentage,  and  their  business 
applications )     30 

3.  Penmanship   (a  test  of  ability  to  write  legibly,  rated  on  the 

specimen  shown  in  the  subject  of  letter  writing)    10 

4.  Letter  writing  (this  subject  is  intended  to  test  the  candidate's 

ability  to  express  himself  intelligently  in  a  business  letter 

on  a  practical  subject)    10 

Total    100 

Candidates  for  this  examination  must  have  reached  their  twenty-first 
birthday  and  must  not  have  passed  their  sixty-fifth. 

For  first  and  second  class  postmasterships  the  examinations  are  non- 
assembled,  and  are  not  radically  different  from  those  under  the  earlier 
Order  as  described  in  the  original  text. 

The  requirements  under  the  current  circular  (July,  1921)  are  as 
follows : 

Prerequisites. — Offices  over  $6,000.— For  offices  paying  more  than 
$6,000  a  year  the  candidates  must  show  that  for  at  least  seven  years 
they  have  successfully  filled  responsible  positions  which  required  ability 
to  organize,  to  direct,  or  to  manage  business  afifairs,  including  such  posi- 
tions in  difi"erent  branches  of  the  Postal  Service ;  candidates  must  also 
show  that  they  have  demonstrated  their  ability  to  meet  and  deal  with  the 
public  satisfactorily.  (Explanatory. — The  nature  of  the  business,  the 
amount  of  clerical  or  office  help  supervised,  the  responsibility  of  the 
position  filled,  the  extent  of  executive  ability  and  initiative  demonstrated, 
and  the  degree  to  which  analysis  of  administrative  and  organization  prob- 
lems was  involved  will  be  given  consideration  in  rating  this  subject.) 

*  40  Stat.  88. 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE  465 

regulations,  liowever.  provide  that  all  aids  "shall  he  appointed 
by  promotion  from  the  position  of  junior  engineer,  deck 
officer,  or  extra  observer,  and  in  no  case  shall  a  person  be 
appointed  to  the  position  of  aid  unless  he  has  served  at  least 
six  months  as  junior  engineer,  deck  officer,  or  extra  observer, 
and  has  performed  satisfactory  services  and  shown  the  proper 
qualifications  for  a  commissioned  officer  in  the  Survey." 

Junior  engineers,  deck  officers,  and  extra  observers  are 
appointed  "from  a  list  of  eligibles  established  by  competitive 
examinations  conducted  in  accordance  with  the  rules  of  the 
United  States  Civil  Service  Commission." 

In  this  service,  therefore,  the  examination  for  initial  ap- 
pointment is  made  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  but  all 
examinations  for  corranissions  or  for  promotion  are  conducted 
by  the  service  itself. 

Laborers. — In  a  governmental  personnel  system  the  re- 
cruitment of  laborers  rec|uires  and  justifies  a  greater  degree  of 
attention  than  would  seem  warranted  by  the  importance  of 
the  positions  involved.  The  economic  class,  from  which  la- 
borers are  recruited  is,  in  the  cities,  the  most  numerous  class, 
and  the  one  in  which  employment  is  most  irregular.  Hence 
a  local  politician  who  can  distribute  government  places  carry- 
ing regular  employment,  however  poorly  paid,  has  a  large  and 
fruitful  field  of  activity.  Moreover,  owing  to  the  difficulty 
of  applying  any  severely  competitive  methods  to  the  selection 
of  laborers,  the  system  of  recruitment  tends  to  be  less  strictly 
safeguarded  than  in  the  case  of  positions  involving  more  spe- 
cialized qualifications.  The  result  is  that  the  spoils  system 
clings  to  labor  positions  with  a  tenacity  almost  equal  to  its 
hold  on  the  higher  executive  positions. 

An  additional  reason  for  watching  the  entrance  to  labor 
positions  with  especial  vigilance  is  that  it  may  furnish  a  "back 
door"  to  the  clerical  service.  The  duties  of  a  "laborer"  in 
many  cases  shade  off  into  those  of  a  "clerk"— as  where  labor- 
ers are  employed  in  stockrooms.  In  a  well  ordered  personnel 
system  properly  qualified  laborers  may  advance  to  certain  cler- 
ical positions.     Thus  those  unable  to  secure  clerical  positions 


466  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

through  the  regular  channels  may  try  to  secure  them  by  en- 
tering the  service  as  laborers  and  subsequently  securing  a  de- 
tail or  a  promotion  to  a  clerical  position. 

The  regulations  by  which  the  principle  of  competitive  ex- 
aminations was  extended  to  labor  positions  (under  the  author- 
ity conferred  on  the  President  by  the  act  of  1871)  are  made 
up,  as  already  indicated,  of  two  sets  of  regulations,  one  ap- 
plying to  labor  positions  in  Washington,  the  other  to  the  field 
services.^ 

The  regulations  differ  considerably  in  matters  of  detail. 
A  substantive  difference  which  is  difficult  of  explanation  is 
that,  while  in  the  case  of  the  field  services,  the  age  limits  are 
fixed  (II,  Section  i)  at  from  20  to  50  years,  which  amounts 
to  almost  no  restriction  at  all,  for  the  positions  at  Washington 
(Regulation  II)  the  age  limits  "may  be  prescribed  by  the 
Commission  wuth  the  approval  of  appointing  officers."  Most 
important,  however,  is  the  difference  in  the  composition  of  the 
"labor  boards"  which  are  set  up  to  administer  the  regulations 
and  to  conduct  the  examinations.  In  Washington  (Regula- 
tion I)  a  "board  of  labor  employment"  is  set  up  for  "each  de- 
])artment  and  independent  executive  office,"  the  head  of  which 
"may  designate  one  of  its  employees  to  serve  as  a  member" 
of  the  board;  and  it  is  provided  that  "the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission shall  supervise  and  direct  the  work  of  the  board,  and 
its  representative  on  the  board,  in  the  absence  of  other  mem- 
bers, shall  perform  the  duties  of  the  Board."  What  is  thus 
provided  is  examination  under  the  supervision  of  a  joint  de- 
partmental and  Civil  Service  Commission  Board. 

In  the  field  service,  a  board  of  labor  employment  has  been 
organized  for  each  of  the  twelve  districts  into  which  the  coun- 
try is  divided  for  the  administration  of  the  regular  competi- 
tive system.  Such  a  district  board  consists  of  three  members 
of  the  force  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  in  that  district, 

'  The  regulations  governing  Washington  were  promulgated  Novem- 
ber 15,  1904  and  amended  July  12,  1905,  and  October  21,  1908.  The  pres- 
ent regulations  governing  the  field  services  (superseding  those  originally 
promulgated  December  12,  1904)  were  promulgated  July  3,  1909,  and 
amended  June  15,  1915. 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE  467 

the  district  secretary  acting  as  chairman,  with  the  proviso  that 
"in  the  event  that  in  any  civil  service  district  there  is  not  a 
sufficient  number  of  the  commission's  employees  available, 
detail  may  be  made  to  the  commission's  force  for  the  filling 
of  vacancies  in  the  labor  employment  board,  until  the  com- 
mission shall  have  men  of  its  own  to  relieve  such  detail."  In 
addition  to  the  three  members  of  the  board  for  the  entire  dis- 
trict, the  Commission  appoints  in  each  city  outside  of  the  dis- 
trict headquarters  where  these  regulations  are  in  force  a  per- 
son in  the  federal  service  in  that  city  as  an  auxiliary  member 
of  the  board  which  serves  in  connection  with  the  appointment 
of  unskilled  laborers  in  the  service  in  such  city. 

Rating  is  made  solely  on  the  basis  of  ability  to  perform 
manual  labor,  as  shown  by  ability  to  lift  a  weight,  or  to  meet 
some  other  test  of  strength,  and  by  physical  examination. 
Such  examination  is  conducted  at  Washington,  and  at  other 
cities  where  available,  by  physicians  in  the  federal  service  de- 
tailed therefor.  Where  such  physicians  are  not  available  the 
Commission  designates  physicians  in  private  practice  for  the 
purpose.  The  ratings  are  relative  and  competitive,  with  pref- 
erence to  qualified  disabled  veterans  and  Civil  War  veterans, 
as  in  the  case  of  eligible  lists  for  regular  classified  positions. 

The  regulations  covering  the  field  service  provide  (III, 
Sec.  4)  that  "a  copy  of  the  register  shall  be  kept  in  a  place 
accessible  to  the  public  in  the  office  of  the  secretary  of  the  dis- 
trict in  \vhich  the  applicants  are  eligible  and  elsewhere  as  the 
commission  may  direct."  No  such  provision  is  made  with 
respect  to  the  Washington  labor  lists. 

The  method  of  certification  is  substantially  the  same 
as  for  classified  positions,  separate  eligible  registers  being 
maintained  for  each  city.  The  Commission  is  authorized, 
however,  in  the  regulations  governing  the  field  service  to  cer- 
tify from  its  register  in  any  civil  service  district  "the  three 
standing  highest  thereon  shown  by  said  register  to  possess  the 
requisite  qualifications  for  the  position  to  be  filled."  ^     The 

*  In  a  note  to  this  regulation,  the  Commission  cites  its  Circular  No. 
1725,  of  June,   1910,  as   follows :     "Under  the  provisions  of  this   section 


468  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

method  of  rating  purely  in  acccnxlance  with  physical  capacity 
is  thus  qualified,  in  the  case  of  the  field  service,  by  permitting 
the  general  lists  to  be  subdivided,  after  examination,  into 
special  lists  on  the  basis  of  special  qualifications,  but  without 
such  special  qualifications  having  been  made  the  basis  of  com- 
petitive rating.  While  this  method  may  seem  to  run  counter 
to  the  strict  competitive  principle,  it  is  doubtless  justified  in 
view  of  the  rarity  w'ith  which  special  qualifications  are  called 
for  in  this  class  of  positions.^ 

Before  passing  to  a  consideration  of  the  two  important 
systems  of  non-competitive  examination  now  in  force — the 
systems  applied  to  the  consular  and  diplomatic  services  and 
to  the  medical  officers  of  the  Public  Health  Service — it  may  be 
well  to  comment  on  this  type  of  examination  in  general. 

Attention  has  been  called  already  to  the  law  of  1853  under 
which  clerical  positions  in  the  departments  at  Washington  were 
filled  upon  non-competitive  or  pass  examinations,  and  to  the 
way  in  which  that  system  broke  down.  In  1902  the  Commis- 
sion made  the  following  comment  in  reference  to  pass  exami- 
nations :  "The  tendency  of  mere  pass  examinations  is  to  be- 
come more  and  more  a  matter  of  form,  and  there  is  no  security 
that  such  examinations  will  long  be  effective  where  there  is 
strong  political  or  personal  pressure  behind  the  candidates." 

In  1908,  in  connection  wath  a  provision  of  a  pending  bill, 
which  called  for  the  appointment  of  a  large  force  required  for 
the  taking  of  the  Thirteenth  Decennial  Census  upon  a  non- 
competitive examination,  the  Commission  presented  at  some 
length  a  discussion  of  the  evils  of  the  non-competitive  as  op- 
posed to  the  competitive  system. 

certifying,  nominating,  or  appointing  officers  may  call  for  such  vouchers 
or  make  such  incjuiries  as  they  may  deem  advisable  to  satisfy  themselves 
as  to  the  possession  of  qualifications  claimetl  by  eligibles.  The  difficulty 
encountered  in  securing  satisfactory  eligibles  for  four-line  teamsters  and 
deckhands  in  the  Quartermaster  Corps  at  San  Francisco,  California,  has 
been  met  by  authorizing  investigations  along  the  lines  set  forth  above." 
'  It  would  seem,  however,  that  certain  of  the  duties  classed  by  the 
Commission  as  unskilled  labor  properly  belong  under  tlie  head  of  skilled 
labor  and  should  be  examined  for  individually  as  such.  The  positions 
of  truckman  and  teamster,  cited  in  the  Commission's  circular  distinguish- 
ing between  "classified"  and  "unclassified''  duties  and  the  position  of 
deckhand,  cited  in  the  preceding  note,  arc  instances  of  tliis. 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE  469 

In  the  interests  of  economy  and  efficiency,  and  with  a  view 
to  securing  an  accurate  census  not  in  any  way  colored  or  af- 
fected by  poHtical  bias,  the  Commission  urges  that  it  be 
amended  by  striking  out  the  word  "non-competitive"  and  sub- 
stituting in  lieu  thereof  the  word  "competitive." 

President  Roosevelt  considered  the  evils  of  non-competitive 
examinations  in  the  Census  Office  great  enough  to  make  them 
the  subject  of  a  special  message  to  Congress.  He  points  out 
in  that  message  that  the  majority  of  clerical  employees  of  the 
last  two  censuses,  appointed  on  the  basis  of  political  favor, 
were  far  below  the  average  of  persons  of  like  grade  appointed 
through  competitive  examinations.  This  is  shown  by  actual 
comparison,  and  is  emphasized  by  the  highest  authorities  of 
census  matters.  Mr.  Frederick  H.  Wines,  assistant  director 
of  the  Twelfth  Census,  says :  "In  making  selections  from  the 
list  of  those  who  passed  the  examinations  no  attention  what- 
ever was  paid  to  their  comparative  rating.  It  was  a  'pass' 
examination,  pure  and  simple." 

With  employees  of  inferior  ability  the  work  is  unneces- 
sarily prolonged,  the  cost  increased,  and  the  accuracy  of  the 
census  discredited.  Hon.  Carroll  D.  Wright  maintains  that 
there  was  a  great  waste  of  both  time  and  money  in  carrying 
on  the  Eleventh  Census.  He  says :  "The  absolute  necessity 
of  bringing  the  whole  census  force  into  the  classified  service, 
in  accordance  with  the  civil  service  act,  seems  to  me  perfectly 
apparent.  Had  this  been  the  rule  in  the  Eleventh  Census  there 
would  have  been,  in  my  opinion,  a  saving  of  at  least  $2,000,000 
and  more  than  a  year's  time."  Subsequently  investigation, 
resulting  from  this  statement,  proved  it  to  be  a  conservative 
one.  Labor  costs  rose  far  above  the  necessary  level  in  the 
Twelfth  Census.  Mr,  Harry  T.  Newcomb,  chief  of  the  divi- 
sion of  agriculture,  makes  this  statement  in  a  letter  to  Presi- 
dent Roosevelt:  "It  was  far  easier,  in  my  experience,  to  ob- 
tain a  score  of  additional  clerks  at  an  annual  cost  of  from 
$14,000  to  $24,000  than  to  secure  an  expenditure  of  $1,000 
for  supplies  which  would  save  the  labor  of  twenty  clerks." 
Business  men  in  all  parts  of  the  country  have  condemned  the 
method  of  appointments  under  non-competitive  examinations 
as  unbusinesslike  and  detrimental  to  the  best  interests  of  the 
nation. 

The  President  also  states  in  his  special  message  that  non- 
competitive examinations  serve  only  as  a  cloak  to  hide  the 
nakedness  of  the  spoils  system.     "Such  examinations,"  he  says, 


470  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

"are  useless  as  checks  upon  patronage  appointments."  Fred- 
erick H.  Wines  says  as  regards  the  Twelfth  Census  "that 
there  were  numerous  instances  in  which  an  unsuccessful  appli- 
cant was  granted  a  second,  third,  or  fourth  trial."  No  atten- 
tion was  paid  to  the  comparative  ratings  of  those  on  the  lists. 
"A  rating  of  75,  with  proper  political  or  other  indorsement," 
says  Mr.  Wines,  "was  sufficient  to  secure  an  appointment  where 
a  rating  of  100  would  count  for  nothing  without  it."  Thus 
non-competitive  examinations  tend  toward  furnishing  employ- 
ees of  minimum  efficiency,  while  competitive  examinations  in- 
sure the  maximum  of  efficiency. 

The  Director  of  the  Census,  instead  of  having  his  mind 
free  to  organize  the  bureau  and  supervise  the  important  fi^ld 
work  carried  on  by  the  supervisors  and  enumerators,  would  be 
forced  to  give  a  large  portion  of  his  time  to  politicians  anxious 
to  get  their  share  of  patronage.  This  was  the  case  in  1890 
and  1900.  Mr.  Porter,  who  was  then  superintendent,  made 
a  statement  about  the  system  forced  upon  him  in  the  census  of 
1890  in  part  as  follows:  "Why  transfer  the  Census  Office  at 
the  busiest  season  into  an  examination  department  for  clerks, 
and  a  director  of  a  vast  scientific  investigation  into  a  dispenser 
of  political  patronage?  It  is  simply  unjust  to  such  an  offi- 
cial." Dr.  John  Shaw  Billings,  in  charge  of  the  division  of 
vital  statistics  of  the  Eleventh  Census,  said :  "The  whole  of 
my  work  in  the  census  has  been  done  in  the  face  of  great  ob- 
stacles, owing  to  repeated  changes  of  clerks  for  political  rea- 
sons, etc.,  and  I  am  tired  of  struggling  with  the  most  unpro- 
pitious  circumstances  that  have  surrounded  the  work." 

The  Commission  also  quotes  from  the  report  of  the  Di- 
rector of  the  Census  for  the  fiscal  year  1908,  in  which  he  says : 

A  "non-competitive"  examination  means  that  every  one 
of  the  many  thousands  who  may  pass  the  examination  will  have 
an  equal  right  to  appointment,  and  that  personal  and  political 
pressure  must  in  the  end,  as  always  before,  become  the  deter- 
mining factor  with  reference  to  the  great  body  of  these  tem- 
porary employments.  I  can  not  too  earnestly  urge  that  the 
Director  of  the  Census  be  relieved  from  this  unfortunate  sit- 
uation. If  these  clerks  can  be  appointed  as  needed,  in  the 
order  certified  from  a  competitive  examination,  a  better  service 
will  be  secured  than  will  otherwise  be  possible,  the  efficiency 
of  the  force  will  be  greatly  increased,  and  the  cost  of  the  cen- 
sus correspondingly  reduced. 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE  471 

The  foregoing  has  been  cited  merely  by  way  of  indicating 
the  evils  which  may  be  inherent  in  a  system  of  non-competitive 
or  pass  examination  when  conducted  on  a  large  scale  for  minor 
positions.  It  is  not  intended  to  imply  that  the  positions  taken 
by  the  Commission  have  any  necessary  application  to  the  selec- 
tion of  a  much  smaller  force  of  high  grade  officers  or  em- 
ployees. Nevertheless,  the  conditions  described  by  the  Commis- 
sion indicate  the  type  of  evil  to  which  a  non-competitive  system 
is  subject  and  which,  in  every  case,  must  be  guarded  against. 
Consular  Service. — All  positions  in  the  foreign  service 
lie  outside  the  competitive  classified  service — the  positions  of 
consul  and  diplomatic  secretary,  because  they  are  presidential 
positions,^  and  the  subordinate  positions  by  virtue  of  a  general 
exception  from  competition  made  by  the  civil  service  rules 
covering  "any  person  employed  in  a  foreign  country  under 
the  State  Department."  ^ 

In  point  of  numbers  and  importance,  the  consuls  are,  of 
course,  far  the  most  important  group  in  the  foreign  service. 

The  desirability  of  eliminating  political  considerations  from 
the  selection  of  consuls  was  given  official  recognition  in  vary- 
ing forms  long  before  any  effective  system  for  the  purpose  was 
actually  developed.  As  early  as  1856  Congress  had  authorized 
the  President  to  provide  regulations  for  the  appointment  of 
vice-consuls,  consular  agents,  commercial  agents,  and  so  forth. 
In  1866  Secretary  Seward  prescribed  a  plan  of  non-competitive 
examinations  to  keep  out  unfit  candidates  for  the  consular 
service,  and  one  examination  was  actually  held  under  his  or- 
ders. In  1872  other  examinations  were  provided.  Again  in 
1895  provision  was  made  for  examinations  embracing  general 
education,  business  training,  and  experience,  and  requiring  a 
knowledge  of  languages  of  the  country  to  which  the  consul  was 
to  be  sent,  of  the  exequatur,  of  the  powers  and  duties  of  con- 
suls, of  treaties,  of  consular  regulations,  and  of  other  subjects. 
An  examination  board  was  organized,  and  while  at  first  the 

*  The  positions  of  ambassador  and  minister,  of  course,  all  fall  under 
this  head,  but  being  filled  without  the  use  of  any  formal  system  of  selec- 
tion, they  fall  outside  the  scope  of  the  present  discussion. 

'  Schedule  A,  I,  7. 


472  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

rules  were  strictly  observed,  and  nearly  50  per  cent  of  the  men 
nominated  were  excluded,  yet  afterwards  the  examinations  be- 
came merely  perfunctory,  and  scarcely  any  of  the  men  selected 
were  rejected. 

Finall}-,  in  1906,  in  response  to  an  insistent  demand  from 
the  business  interests  of  the  country,  President  Roosevelt,  by 
Executive  Order,  established  a  system  of  non-competitive  ex- 
aminations for  entrance  to  the  consular  service  that,  with 
modifications,  is  still  in  force. 

The  way  was  paved  for  this  order  by  an  act  of  Congress 
classifying  the  several  consular  offices  by  salary.^ 

The  order  of  President  Roosevelt  provided  that  thereafter 
all  vacancies  in  the  position  of  consul,  Class  7  (of  which  the 
salary  is  $3,000)  ^  or  any  higher  class  should  be  filled  by  pro- 
motion, either  from  lower  positions  in  the  consular  service 
or  from  positions  in  the  State  Department.  For  appointment 
to  Classes  8  and  9  carrying  salaries  of  $2,500  and  $2,000,  re- 
spectively, the  order  established  the  system  of  non-competitive 
examination  about  to  be  discussed. 

Under  the  order  ^  a  board  of  examiners  for  admission  to 
the  consular  service  is  created,  consisting  of  the  Secretary  of 
State  or  such  officer  of  the  Department  of  State  as  the  Presi- 
dent may  designate,  the  Director  of  the  Consular  Service  and 
the  Chief  Examiner  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  (or  some 
other  person  whom  the  Commission  may  designate).  In  order 
to  obtain  admission  to  the  examinations,  designation  of  the 
candidate  must  be  made  by  the  President,  who  acts,  of  course, 
on  the  recommendation  of  the  Department.  The  only  official 
rule  which  has  been  promulgated  relative  to  the  designation  is 
that  contained  in  the  original  Executive  Order  which  provides 
that  "in  designation  for  appointment  subject  to  examination 

^  Act  of  April  s,  1906,  34  Stat.  99. 

"  Under  a  recent  act  the  position  of  "Vice-Consul  de  carriere,  Class 
11"  with  a  salary  of  $2,750,  has  been  set  up  between  the  grades  of  Con- 
sul, Class  7  (at  $3,000)  and  Consul,  Class  8  (at  $2,500)  ;  and  the  execu- 
tive order  has  been  correspondingly  amended  to  require  this  new  grade 
also  to  be  fdled  only  by  promotion. 

'As  amended  on  December  12,  1906,  April  20,  1907,  and  December  8, 
1909.. 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE  473 

.  .  .  due  regard  will  be  had  to  the  rule  that  as  between  candi- 
dates of  equal  merit  appointments  should  be  made  to  secure 
proportional  representation  of  all  the  states  and  territories  in 
the  consular  service,  and  neither  in  the  designation  for  ex- 
amination nor  certification  for  appointment  will  the  political 
affiliations  of  the  candidate  be  considered." 

As  to  the  extent  to  which  political  considerations  do  actually 
govern,  it  is  extremely  difficult  to  offer  an  opinion.  The  Com- 
mittee of  the  National  Civil  Service  Reform  League  which, 
during  the  year  191 8- 19,  made  an  investigation  into  the  per- 
sonnel aspects  of  the  foreign  service,  was  apparently  unable 
to  obtain  any  exact  information  on  this  point.  In  its  report 
it  says :  ^ 

Your  committee  is  informed  that  all  applications  are  passed 
upon  by  the  Third  Assistant  Secretary  of  State,  who  is  him- 
self a  political  appointee.  The  Third  Assistant  Secretary  of 
State  does  not,  we  are  informed,  have  anything  to  do  with 
the  men  once  they  are  in  the  service,  but  is  called  upon  to  ex- 
amine and  give  his  approval  upon  all  examinations.  We  are 
informed — upon  good  authority — that  the  applications  to  take 
the  examinations  are  only  thrown  out  in  those  cases  where 
they  have  been  so  short  a  time  citizens  of  the  United  States 
that  it  might  be  inadvisable  to  give  them  an  appointment,  or 
else  when,  on  the  face  of  their  applications,  they  are  mani- 
festly unfit.  Nevertheless,  the  proper  method  of  excluding 
these  men  would  seem  to  be  in  the  examination  itself.  Nor 
does  there  appear  to  be  any  good  reason  why  a  political  of- 
ficer should  sit  in  the  Department  of  State  to  watch  over  what- 
ever remains  of  patronage  for  distribution. 

The  examination  is  held  at  Washington  whenever  the  needs 
of  the  service  require.  The  Committee  of  the  National  Civil 
Service  Reform  League  which  investigated  the  foreign  service 
urged  that  the  written  examinations  should  be  held  in  the  prin- 
cipal cities.     This  recommendation  seems  wise,  not  only  be- 

*  Report  on  the  Foreign  Service,  published  by  the  National  Civil  Serv- 
ice Reform  League,  1919,  p.  24.  The  Director  of  the  Consular  Service 
has  stated  in  response  to  a  direct  inquiry  that  "in  the  past,  nearly  all  of 
the  men  who  presented  their  formal  applications  to  the  Department  of 
State  have  been  designated  for  examination."  (Letter  to  the  Institute 
for  Government  Research.) 


474  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

cause  it  would  widen  the  interest  in  and  the  competition  for 
these  places,  but  also  because  as  the  committee  pointed  out,  a 
more  general  representation  from  all  parts  of  the  country 
would  be  obtained.  Under  present  conditions,  the  committee 
states,  despite  the  rule  of  apportionment,  an  undue  proportion 
of  the  service  is  recruited  from  persons  resident  at  the  Capital, 
who  are  only  nominal  residents  of  the  states  to  which  they  ar^ 
accredited  in  determining  the  quotas  for  apportionment  pur- 
poses.^ The  recommendation  of  the  committee  contemplates, 
of  course,  an  oral  examination  at  Washington  of  those  who 
have  passed  the  written  examination  successfully. 

The  scope  of  examinations  is  determined  in  the  first  place 
by  the  original  executive  order,  which  provides  that  "among 
the  subjects  shall  be  included  at  least  one  modern  language 
other  than  English,  the  natural,  industrial,  and  commercial  re- 
sources and  the  commerce  of  the  United  States,  especially  with 
reference  to  the  possibilities  of  increasing  and  extending  the 
trade  of  the  United  States  with  foreign  countries,  political 
economy,  elements  of  international  commerce,  and  maritime 
law."  Subject  to  these  provisions  the  board  of  examiners  is 
empowered  to  determine  the  scope  and  method  of  examination. 
In  addition  to  the  subjects  thus  prescribed  by  Executive  Order, 
the  examinations  now  embrace  also  arithmetic,  American  his- 
tory, government  and  institutions,  and  modern  history. 

It  is  the  practice  for  the  Board  of  Examiners  itself  to  rate 
the  candidates  on  their  oral  examination.  The  written  papers 
are  referred  to  the  Civil  Service  Commission  for  rating.  The 
Executive  Order  provides  that  "examination  papers  shall  l)e 
rated  on  the  scale  of  lOO  and  no  person  rated  at  less  than  80 
shall  be  eligible  for  certification." 

The  section  regarding  certification  provides  that  "whenever 
a  vacancy  shall  occur  in  the  8th  or  9th  class  of  consuls  which 
the  President  may  deem  it  expedient  to  fill,"  the  board  of  ex- 
aminers shall  certify  to  the  Secretary  of  State,  who  in  turn 
transmits  to  the  President  "for  his  information,"  "the  list  of 

*  Report  on  the  Foreign  Service,  published  by  the  National  Civil 
Service  Reform  League,  1919,  p.  25. 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE  475 

those  persons  eligible  for  appointment,  accompanying  the  cer- 
tificate with  a  detailed  report  showing  the  qualifications,  as 
revealed  by  examination,  of  the  persons  so  certified.  If  it  be 
desired  to  fill  a  vacancy  in  a  consulate  in  a  country  in  which  the 
United  States  exercises  extraterritorial  jurisdiction,  the  Secre- 
tary of  State  shall  so  inform  the  Board  of  Examiners,  who 
shall  include  in  the  list  of  names  certified  by  it  only  such 
persons  as  have  passed  the  examination  provided  for  in  this 
order,  and  who  also  have  passed  an  examination  in  the  funda- 
mental principles  of  the  common  law,  the  rules  of  evidence, 
and  the  trial  of  civil  and  criminal  cases." 

It  will  be  noted  that  the  provision  of  the  executive  order 
calling  for  apportionment  among  the  states  in  designations  for 
examination  applies  equally  to  appointments  after  examina- 
tion. There  is  little  to  be  added  to  what  has  already  been  said 
with  regard  to  the  rule  of  apportionment  as  applied  to  the 
classified  service.  Discussing  the  matter  with  special  reference 
to  the  foreign  service  the  Committee  on  Foreign  Service  of 
the  National  Civil  Service  Reform  League  reached  the  conclu- 
sion that  the  rule  of  apportionment  had  outlived  its  useful- 
ness and  should  be  entirely  abolished. 

The  committee  of  the  National  Civil  Service  Reform 
League  unfortunately  omitted  to  discuss  one  of  the  most  im- 
portant phases  of  the  examination  system — the  extent  to  which 
the  relative  ratings  given  by  the  board  of  examiners  are  per- 
mitted to  control,  subject  to  the  apportionment  requirement  of 
the  Executive  Order  just  mentioned,  in  the  final  selection  of 
names  for  recommendation  to  the  President  for  nomination. 
Direct  inquiry  made  of  the  Director  of  the  Consular  Service  has 
elicited  the  statement  that 

There  is  no  rule  requiring  the  selection  of  men  from  the 
eligible  list  in  accordance  with  their  examination  standings. 
The  Department  does,  however,  give  consideration  to  the 
standing  of  candidates  on  the  eligible  list  when  selecting  men 
for  appointment.^ 

*  Letter  to  the  Institute  for  Government  Research,  January  29,  1920. 


476  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

The  committee  of  the  Reform  League,  while  attempting 
no  characterization  of  the  existing  situation  with  respect  to 
the  entrance  of  political  influence  in  selection,  recommends  that 
the  examinations  be  open  to  all  and  that  the  ratings  of  the  suc- 
cessful candidates  be  published.  Its  recommendations  on  the 
matter  of  selection  from  among  those  successful  are  not 
entirely  clear,  but  consistency  would  require  that  selec- 
tions be  made  substantially  in  accordance  with  the  order  of 
rating.^ 

The  committee  further  recommends  that  the  examinations 
be  held  under  the  auspices  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  in- 
stead of  under  the  auspices  of  the  Department  of  State.  The 
intent  of  all  these  recommendations  is  the  same,  namely,  that 
regardless  of  the  degree  of  fidelity  to  the  merit  principle  with 
which  the  department  may  administer  its  closed  non-competi- 
tive system  of  selection,  it  is  desirable  that  the  system  be  placed 
upon  a  basis  which  will,  so  to  speak,  give  notice  to  the  world 
that  it  is  actuated  solely  by  considerations  of  merit.  As  long 
as  the  present  closed  non-competitive  system  exists,  the  public 
cannot  have  full  confidence  in  its  administration. 
Diplomatic  Service. — Formalized  methods  of  selection 
were  applied  to  the  diplomatic  service  four  years  after  they 
had  been  successfully  applied  to  the  consular  service.  By  order 
of  November  26,  1909,  President  Taft,  in  addition  to  order- 
ing a  classification  of  the  secretaryships  in  the  diplomatic 
service  "according  to  the  importance,  volume,  difficulty,  or  other 
aspects  of  the  work  done  by  each  mission  in  proportion  to 
the  number  of  men  allotted  to  it,"  and  prescribing  that  "un- 
official appointments  from  outside  the  service  .  .  .  should  be 
made  only  to  the  lower  grades,"  created  a  board  "to  deter- 

'  The  committee  recommends  that  those  successful  in  tlie  written 
examination  be  examined  orally  at  Washington  and  that  "candidates  who 
pass  the  oral  examination  be  given  a  period  of  trial  and  instruction  in 
the  Department  of  State  before  nomination  for  appointment."  These 
recommendations  do  not  seem  to  contemplate  the  possibility  that  a  num- 
ber passing  the  oral  examination  and  thus  placed  on  trial  in  the  De- 
partment of  State  may  substantially  exceed  the  number  actually  required 
to  fill  current  vacancies.  Clearly  selection  must  be  made  from  among 
those  who  pass  the  oral  examination  only  to  a  number  sufficient  to  meet 
anticipated  needs. 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE  477 

mine  the  qualifications  of  persons  deaignated  by  the  President 
for  examination,  to  determine  their  fitness  for  possible  appoint- 
ment as  secretaries  of  embassy  or  legation."  This  board  now 
consists  of  the  Assistant  Secretary  of  State,  the  Third  As- 
sistant Secretary  of  State,  the  solicitor  for  the  Department  of 
State,  the  chief  of  the  diplomatic  bureau,  the  chief  of  the  bu- 
reau of  appointments,  and  the  Chief  Examiner  of  the  Civil 
Service  Commission,  or  such  persons  as  may  be  designated  to 
service  in  their  stead.  The  subjects  of  examination  do  not 
differ  materially  from  those  prescribed  for  the  consular  service 
except  that  diplomatic  usage  is  included.  The  method  of  ex- 
amination, and  the  practice  in  certification  and  appointment, 
are  substantially  the  same  as  in  the  consular  service. 

In  19 10,  President  Taft,  in  a  message  to  Congress,  recom- 
mended that  the  application  of  the  merit  principle  to  the  con- 
sular and  diplomatic  service  be  given  a  statutory  character.  He 
stated  his  conviction  "that  the  enactment  into  law  of  the  general 
principles  of  the  existing  executive  regulations  could  not  fail 
to  efifect  further  improvement  of  both  branches  of  the  foreign 
service."  ^  Similarly,  in  1917,  the  Civil  Service  Commission 
declared  that  "the  system  of  appointment  to  the  Consular 
Service  rests  upon  an  Executive  Order  and  does  not  have  the 
sanction  of  Congress.  It  is  believed  that  if  the  system  were 
supported  by  statute  there  would  be  wider  public  persuasion 
of  its  stability."  ^ 

Non-competitive  examinations  are  given  by  the  State  De- 
partment for  the  positions  of  consular  assistant  and  student 
interpreter.^  The  differences  between  the  methods  in  use  for 
these  positions  and  those  already  reviewed  in  connection  with 
the  consular  service  are  too  unimportant  to  warrant  detailed 
examination. 

^Quoted  from  Twenty-seventh  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil 
Service  Commission  (1910),  p.  33. 

*  Thirty-fourth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion  (1917),  p.  xviii. 

'  Clerks  in  consular  offices  are  appointed  without  formal  examination 
of  any  kind.  There  is  special  statutory  provision  (R.  S.,  Sees.  1704  and 
1705)  for  the  appointment  by  the  President,  after  examination,  of  13 
"consular  clerks,"  but  this  provision  is  obsolete. 


4/8  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Public  Health  Service  Medical  Officers. — The  system  of 
selection  for  the  medical  officers  ^  of  the  Public  Health  Service 
is  not  only  a  non-competitive  system,  but  is  unique  in  that  it  is 
administered  wholly  by  the  service  itself.  As  has  been  pointed 
out  in  a  preceding  chapter  all  medical  officers  of  the  service 
are  "presidential"  appointees  and  the  system  of  selection  is 
based  upon  a  provision  of  law  prescribing  that  "no  person 
shall  be  appointed  as  a  medical  officer  of  the  service  until  after 
passing  a  satisfactory  examination  in  the  several  branches  of 
surgery,  medicine,  and  hygiene  before  a  board  of  medical  offi- 
cers of  the  said  service."  ^  Thus  it  would  appear  that  in  the 
case  of  this  service  it  would  be  beyond  the  power  of  the  Presi- 
dent, despite  the  blanket  authority  over  methods  of  selection 
conferred  upon  him  by  the  statutes,  to  substitute  for  the  ex- 
amination by  a  board  of  officers  of  the  service  an  examination 
by  the  Civil  Service  Commission  or  any  other  organization ;  but 
there  is  nothing  in  this  act  that  would  prohibit  him  from  es- 
tablishing such  a  system  of  examination  in  addition  to,  and 
either  before  or  after,  the  examination  by  the  board  of  the 
service.  He  could  moreover  require  such  examination,  and 
indeed  even  the  statutory  examination,  to  be  an  open  competi- 
tive examination. 

Prospective  candidates  for  examination  submit  through  the 
Surgeon  General,  on  a  blank  form  provided,  a  statement  of 
training  and  experience  and  on  the  basis  of  this,  designation 
for  examination  is  either  made  or  withheld.  Those  designated 
for  examination  are  subjected  to  both  an  oral  and  written  ex- 
amination, conducted  by  a  board  composed  of  medical  officers 
of  the  service. 

The  present  practice  is  to  designate  for  examination  vir- 
tually all  applicants,  only  those  manifestly  unfit  being  denied 

^  This  applies  only  to  the  permanent  commissioned  medical  officers  of 
the  service.  Temporary  non-commiss.ioned  officers  are  frequently  ap- 
pointed under  the  title  of  "acting  assistant  surgeon."  These  positions 
fall  in  the  competitive  classified  service,  and  selection  for  appointment 
to  them  is  by  the  regular  system  of  competitive  examination  conducted 
by  the  Civil  Service  Commission.  There  is  also  in  the  ruhlic  Health 
Service  a  scientific  personnel,  which  is  appointed  after  certification  by 
the  Civil  Service  Commission. 

*Act  of  January  4,  1889,  25  Stat.  639. 


THE  UNCLASSIFIED  SERVICE  479 

entrance  to  the  examination.  Moreover,  while  there  is  no 
absolute  rule,  the  relative  order  of  rating  established  by  the 
examination  is  in  general  the  order  in  which  the  candidates 
are  recommended  to  the  President  for  nomination.  The  sys- 
tem may  l^e  thus  described  as  one  of  informal  open  competitive 
examination,  the  principle  of  open  competition  being  given 
full  recognition  without  being  formally  established.  The  ques- 
tion whether  this  informal  system  of  open  competition  should 
give  way  to  one  in  which  the  principle  of  open  competition 
is  formally  recognized  is  thus  one  which  has  only  a  secondary 
importance  from  a  practical  standpoint.  On  general  principles, 
however,  the  change  is  to  be  recommended  as  tending  to 
insure  a  fuller  confidence  on  the  part  of  the  public  in  the  fair- 
ness of  the  examination  process. 

A  similar  position  may  be  taken  with  respect  to  the  par- 
ticipation of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  in  the  process  of 
examination.  At  the  present  time,  as  indicated,  it  has  abso- 
lutely no  connection  with  these  examinations.  Doubtless  its 
participation  would  do  little  if  anything  to  improve  the  caliber 
of  those  recruited  by  the  examination,  or  to  make  the  ex- 
aminations more  economical  or  more  satisfactory  from  a  tech- 
nical standpoint,  but  like  the  conversion  of  the  system  to  one 
of  open  competition  rather  than  of  non-competitive  designation 
and  selection,  it  would  place  upon  the  whole  system  of  selec- 
tion much  more  publicly  and  definitively  the  stamp  of  impar- 
tiality. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  INDIVIDUAL   EFFICIENCY 

The  preceding  group  of  chapters  have  concerned  themselves 
primarily  with  the  problem  of  filling  a  given  position  with  the 
most  capable  person  available.  It  is  to  this  general  problem, 
that  of  selection,  that  discussion  of  the  personnel  problem  is 
usually  confined.  To  the  equally  important  problem  of  how 
to  engage  the  interest  and  zeal  of  the  employee  when  selected, 
or,  failing  that,  how  to  secure  his  elimination  from  the  service, 
public  attention  is  seldom  directed. 

The  prospect  of  promotion,  or  even  of  assignment  to  more 
agreeable  or  more  promising  duties,  as  a  reward  for  faithful 
service,  is,  of  course,  in  itself  a  valuable  stimulus  to  such 
service ;  and,  in  the  chapters  dealing  with  promotion  and  as- 
signment methods,  the  need  of  emphasizing  this  phase  of  the 
promotion  or  assignment  process  in  devising  those  methods 
was  insisted  upon.  These  alone,  however,  are  not  sufficient. 
They  must  be  supplemented  by  other  efforts  having  for  their 
purpose  to  appeal  directly  to  the  self-interest  of  the  employee, 
and  to  build  up  a  morale  or  esprit  de  corps  in  the  service  as  a 
whole. 

The  extent  to  which  such  other  efforts  are  made,  aside 
from  the  enlargement  of  the  opportunity  for  advancement,  to 
reward  the  individual  employee  in  proportion  to  his  faithful- 
ness and  his  results  will  determine  perhaps  more  than  any 
other  single  element  or  group  of  elements  the  net  efficiency 
of  the  service.  The  importance  to  the  whole  prol)lem  of  per- 
sonnel administration  of  the  inquiry  to  which  the  present  chap- 
ter is  devoted,  therefore,  can  hardly  be  overstated.  Hand  in 
hand  with  methods  for  rewarding  zeal  and  efficiency  must  go 
methods  for  penalizing  sloth  fulness,  incompetence  or  miscon- 

480 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  481 

duct,  and,  where  necessary,  for  eliminating  altogether  from  the 
service  those  who  do  not  prove  amenable  to  any  milder 
measures. 

Methods  of  reward  or  punishment  fall  chiefly  under  two 
heads — those  affecting  the  compensation  of  the  employee  with- 
out necessarily  affecting  his  status  or  position,  and  those  affect- 
ing his  status  or  position,  whether  as  respects  promotion,  as- 
signment, lay-off,  reduction,  or  dismissal.  Manifestly  it  is 
in  the  field  of  compensation  that  the  most  direct  and  positive 
stimulus  to  zeal  and  effort  is  to  be  found. 
Records  as  a  Means  of  Promoting  Individual  Efficiency. — 
At  the  forefront  of  administrative  measures  having  for  their 
purpose  the  stimulation  of  individual  effort  is  establishing  in 
the  minds  of  employees  the  fact  that  their  work  is  under  con- 
stant scrutiny  and  that  the  extent  to  which  they  render  good 
or  bad  service  will  be  brought  to  the  attention  of  their  superior 
officers.  The  maintenance  of  efficiency  records  thus  has  a 
value  beyond  that  of  furnishing  information  upon  which  pro- 
motions wall  be  partly  based. 

In  the  discussion  of  the  place  of  efficiency  records  in  pro- 
motion, the  position  was  taken  that,  invaluable  as  such  records 
might  be  in  assisting  or  qualifying  the  judgment  of  administra- 
tive officers  in  making  selection  for  promotion,  they  could  not 
ordinarily  be  safely  relied  upon  as  a  mechanical  or  automatic 
method  of  making  such  selection,  or  even  as  a  major  factor 
entering  into  any  dther  mechanical  or  automatic  method.  In 
connection  wath  most  of  the  matters  forming  the  subject  of 
the  present  chapter,  however,  no  such  difficult  selective  func- 
tion is  required  of  the  efficiency  record.  It  is  sufficient  that 
the  record  be  of  the  more  simple  character  suggested  as  suitable 
for  use  merely  as  a  basis  for  action  on  promotions,  though 
the  record  may  be  given  much  greater,  and  in  some  cases, 
controlling  influence.  Again,  in  the  interests  of  uniformity, 
as  between  the  several  branches  of  a  department,  or  bureau, 
it  is  desirable  that  the  records  should  all  be  reviewed  by  a  cen- 
tral board  composed  of  representatives  of  the  several  branches; 
but  such  review  need  merely  seek  to  effect  the  observance  by  all 


482  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

officers  charged  with  making  entries  on  efficiency  records  of 
a  consistent  and  uniform  practice  and  standard,  rather  than, 
as  in  the  case  of  promotion  records  to  which  controlhng  in- 
fluence is  given,  to  revise  individual  ratings. 
Piece  Work  as  a  Means  of  Promoting  Individual  Effi- 
ciency.— The  most  obvious  methods  of  rewarding  effi- 
ciency through  compensation  are  those  of  piece-work  rates 
and  bonuses,  or  combinations  of  both  methods.  These  meth- 
ods, of  course,  are  adapted  peculiarly,  if  not  solely,  to  indus- 
trial production.  Their  limitations  as  applied  to  governmental 
operations  are  obvious;  nevertheless  the  field  over  which  the 
method  is  already  applied  is  larger  than  is  commonly  appreci- 
ated, as  is  also  the  area  of  possible  extension.  Piece-work  rates 
are  already  employed  in  the  arsenals  and  the  naval  ordnance 
factories  in  the  operations  in  those  establishments  which  are 
capable  of  being  computed  on  such  a  basis.  In  the  printing 
of  the  paper  currency,  too,  piece-work  rates  are  largely  em- 
ployed. The  largest  unoccupied  field  for  the  application  of 
this  principle  at  the  present  time  w'ould  seem  to  be  in  certain  of 
the  clerical  organizations  in  the  departments  at  Washington, 
where  the  work  is  of  a  routine,  standardized  nature  and  the 
quantity  of  output  can  be  accurately  measured.  During  the 
war,  when  administrative  methods  were  largely  in  the  hands 
of  men  without  previous  government  experience,  and  when 
compensation  matters  were  left  to  administrative  discretion 
to  an  unusual  extent,  this  method  was  applied,  indeed,  in  sev- 
eral cases  to  clerical  work  in  Washington,  and  with  excellent 
results. 

Periodic  Salary  Increases  as  a  Means  of  Promoting  In- 
dividual Efficiency. — For  far  the  greater  part  of  the 
federal  service,  how^ever,  no  method  based  on  exact  measure- 
ment of  the  quantity  of  work  produced  is  possible.  For  those 
employments  to  which  the  methods  of  piece-w^ork  rates  or 
bonuses  are  not  applicable,  comprising  far  the  greater  num- 
ber of  positions  in  the  federal  service,  the  cognate  method  of 
rewarding  effort  and  efficiency  is  that  of  increasing  the  com- 
pensation rate.     The  distinction  between  a  mere  increase  in 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  483 

compensation  and  a  promotion  or  a  reassignment  to  new  duties 
has  been  drawn  already.  The  method  of  increasing  compen- 
sation rates  encountered  in  most  small  organizations  is  that 
of  giving  consideration,  usually  at  stated  intervals,  to  the 
possibility,  in  view  of  the  financial  conditions  of  the  organiza- 
tion, of  increasing  the  compensation  of  such  of  the  employees 
as  seem  deserving.  The  obvious  difficulty  with  this  method 
of  determining  salary  increases  is  its  uncertainty  to  the  em- 
ployee. There  is  no  fixed  standard  by  which  he  may  know  in 
advance  whether  or  not  he  is  earning  an  increase.  Moreover, 
the  standard  is  not  merely  undefined  but  it  may,  and  almost 
invariably  does,  vary  from  time  to  time,  so  that  inequality  in 
rates  between  those  doing  substantially  the  same  work  and 
with  substantially  the  same  efficiency  results.  In  their  reaction 
from  the  situation  produced  by  this  method  of  handling  the 
problem  some  large  organizations  have  gone  to  the  opposite 
extreme  and  adopted  the  policy  of  "automatic"  increases  of 
salary.  Under  this  plan,  a  range  of  rates  is  fixed  for  each 
position  or  grade  of  work,  the  rates  increasing  by  rather  small 
increments,  at  fixed  periods.  As  many  as  five  or  six  dififer- 
ent  rates  are  thus  provided  for  the  same  position  or  grade, 
seldom  more.  The  result  is  a  system  under  which  the  em- 
ployee may  remain  for  a  considerable  period  without  proijio- 
tion  and  yet  be  continually  automatically  advancing  in  com- 
pensation through  the  period. 

The  theory  upon  which  this  method  of  increasing  compen- 
sation is  defended  is  that  it  may  be  assumed  that  any  employee 
who  performs  his  work  sufficiently  satisfactorily  to  escape 
dismissal  or  reduction  necessarily  increases  in  his  value  to 
the  organization  with  length  of  service,  or  within  the  limits 
of  the  period  mentioned,  even  though  his  duties  remain  un- 
changed. In  the  large,  this  is  doubtlessly  true.  There  is,  how- 
ever, a  considerable  proportion  of  cases  in  which  this  is  not 
so.  The  method  is  thus  open  to  the  serious  criticism  that  it 
is  of  no  value  in  spurring  on  the  individual  to  increased  effort. 
Another  ground  on  which  the  system  of  wholly  automatic  sal- 
ary  increases   is   defended   is   that,   regardless   of   the   actual 


484  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

increase  in  the  value  of  the  employee's  services  with  increasing 
lengtli  of  service,  the  method  is  of  value  in  that  it  makes  for 
a  more  contented  frame  of  mind  on  the  part  of  most  of  the 
employees  than  does  a  flat  rate. 

Between  the  two  extremes  of  the  system  in  which  each 
salary  increase  is  regarded  as  an  original  question  and  one 
in  which  salary  increases  are  automatic  and  subject  to  no  ques- 
tion, lies  what  might  be  termed  a  semi-automatic  system.  In 
this,  while  the  regular  award  of  the  periodic  increase  is 
regarded  as  the  normal  condition,  a  measure  of  discretion  is 
imposed  on  the  administrative  superiors  of  the  employee  in 
withholding  the  award  of  the  increase  under  certain  defined 
conditions ;  and  perhaps  also  of  awarding  increases  at  other 
than  the  regular  periods  or  in  amounts  greater  than  the 
regular  amounts  for  superior  efficiency,  also  under  defined  con- 
ditions. This  system  preserves  substantially  all  the  value  in- 
herent in  a  system  of  automatic  increases  and  yet  permits  the 
salary  increases  to  be  used  as  a  means  for  maintaining  and 
spurring  on  individual  efficiency. 

For  the  success  of  such  a  system  it  is  necessary  that  a 
normal  or  reasoffeble  standard  of  efficiency  be  first  defined, 
a  failure  to  attain  which  during  the  period  fixed  will  result 
in  the  withholding  of  the  employee's  increase  for  that  period, 
and  that  means  be  provided  for  determining  in  the  case  of 
each  employee  whether  this  standard  has,  or  has  not,  been 
attained. 

It  may  be  urged  that  such  a  regulation  is  illogical  in  that 
an  employee  who  does  not  show  such  proficiency  should  be 
dismissed  out  of  hand.  It  is  hard  to  meet  this  attack  on  a 
theoretical  basis;  but  for  practical  purposes  it  is  sufficient  to 
say  that  the  cold-blooded  application  of  a  canon  so  seemingly 
just  is  not  workable  in  any  personnel  system  and  certainly  not 
in  the  federal  service.  In  a  subsequent  section  suggestions 
are  made  looking  to  the  strengthening  of  the  service  generally 
through  lessening  the  difficulty  standing  in  the  way  of  admin- 
istrative officers  in  removing  or  demoting  the  inefficient.  But 
even    were    the    condition    to    which    these    suggestions    look 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY 


485 


realized,  there  would  still  remain  a  twilight  zone  in  which 
the  inefficiency  of  the  employee  would  not  be  sufficiently  glar- 
ing to  impel  the  administrative  officers  to  act.  It  is  in  this 
class  of  cases  that  the  method  of  withholding  annual  or  other 
periodic  increments  from  the  sub-standard  employee  finds  its 
proper  application. 

It  is  not  easy  to  characterize  the  present  situation  in  the 
federal  service  with  respect  to  the  application  of  the  several 
methods  of  awarding  the  increases  in  compensation  just  traced. 
The  wholly  automatic  method  is  to  be  found  in  only  two  serv- 
ices— the  Public  Health  Service  and  the  Coast  and  Geodetic 
Survey — and  the  system  here  is  not  precisely  that  above  out- 
lined as  the  automatic  system,  being  based  upon  the  army 
system  of  "longevity"  pay.  Under  this  system,  10  per  cent 
is  added  to  the  "base  pay"  of  the  grade  occupied  by  the  officer 
for  each  five  years  of  service,  counting  from  his  entrance  into 
the  service,  and  regardless  of  his  length  of  service  in  the  grade. 
A  maximum  of  40  per  cent  increase,  attained  at  the  end  of  20 
years'  service  is  fixed ;  and  certain  maximum  salaries,  less  than 
would  be  reached  under  the  40  per  cent  maximum,  are  fixed  for 
the  higher  grade. ^  This  system  of  "longevity"  applies  only  to 
the  commissioned  medical  officers. 

The   regulations  of  the   Public  Health  Service  approved 
August  29,  1920,  provide  for  longevity  pay  for  the  non-com- 

*  These  maximum  salaries  are  as  follows : 


Base 
Pay 

Maximum  Base  and 
Longevity  Pay 

Maximum  Longevity 
Increase 

Surgeons  and  Lieut. 
Commanders    .... 

Senior  Surgeons  and 
Commanders    .... 

Assistant  Surgeons 
General  and  Cap- 
tains     

$3,000 
$3,500 

$4,000 

$4,000 

$4,500       , 
\ 

$S:000 

$1,000-331^% 
$1,000—28.5% 

$1,000—25% 

These  officers  were  granted  temporary  increased  pay  until  June  30, 
1922,  by  the  Act  of  May  18,  1920  (41  Stat.  601),  but  this  increase  was  a 
fixed  sum  for  each  grade  and  does  alter  the  base  pay  and  maximum  base 
and  longevity  pay. 


486  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

missioned  employees  known  as  the  scientific  personnel  and  for 
administrative  assistants.  The  Sundry  Civil  Act  for  the  fiscal 
year  1922,  approved  ]\Iarch  4,  1921/  under  the  heading 
Bureau  of  War  Risk  Insurance  prohibits  the  use  of  any 
"money  hereby  appropriated"  for  longevity  pay  to  "any  em- 
ployee other  than  the  commissioned  medical  officers  provided 
for  by  statute."  While  technically  this  legislation  would  prob- 
ably apply  only  to  employees  paid  from  funds  transferred  to 
the  Public  Health  Servnce  by  the  Bureau  of  War  Risk  Insur- 
ance,- it  is  likely  that  it  was  the  intention  of  the  framers  of  the 
law  to  have  it  apply  to  all  persons  in  the  Public  Health  Service. 
Moreover  there  would  be  great  administrative  difficulty  in 
allowing  longevity  pay  to  persons  paid  from  one  appropriation 
and  denying  it  to  those  doing  similar  work  and  paid  from 
another  appropriation.  The  amended  regulations  covering  this 
situation  had  not  been  issued  as  this  report  goes  to  press. 

In  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  the  act  of  May  18,  1920,^ 
provides  that  commissioned  officers  of  that  organization  should 
receive  the  same  pay  and  allowances,  including  longevity  as 
officers  in  the  Navy  with  whom  they  hold  relative  rank.'* 

Semi-automatic  systems  of  salary  increases  are  found  in 
the  postal  service  with  respect  to  postal  clerks  and  railway 
mail  clerks.  The  law  her^  places  a  considerable  discretion 
in  the  hands  of  the  Postmaster  General.  The  salary  of  postal 
clerks,  assistant  superintendents  of  delivery,  mails,  money 
order,   registry,   stations,  etc.,  are  all  graded,  the  difiference 

'41   Stat.  1374. 

*  Charged  to  Veterans'  Bureau  by  Act  of  August  9,  1921. 
^  41  Stat.  603. 

*  The  Act  of  May  22,  1917  (40  Stat.  84)  provides  that  officers  in  the 
Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  designated  assistants  and  receiving  more 
than  $2000  per  annum  should  be  appointed  hydrographic  and  geodetic 
engineers,  that  officers  designated  assistants  and  receiving  between  $1200 
and  $2000  should  be  appointed  junior  hydrographic  and  geodetic  en- 
gineers, and  that  officers  designated  as  aides  should  be  appointed  aides. 
The  Act  further  provides  that  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  may  be 
transferred  to  the  Army  or  Navy  during  a  time  of  national  emergency 
and  prescribes  the  rank  of  commissioned  officers  at  various  salaries  when 
serving  with  the  Army  and  Navy.  The  Act  of  May  18,  1920  (41  Stat. 
603)  provided  that  the  commissioned  officers  of  the  Coast  and  Geodetic 
Survey  should  thereafter  receive  the  pay  and  allowances  of  officers  of 
the  Navy  with  whom  they  hold  relative  rank  as  prescribed  in  the  Act 
of   May  22,   1917. 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  487 

between  each  grade  and  the  next  being  usually  $100,  though 
in  the  higher  positions  $100  differences  alternate  with  $200  and, 
in  a  few  cases,  even  with  $300  and  $400  increases.^  The  law 
provides  that  promotions  shall  be  made  annually,  and  that  "no 
promotion  shall  be  made  except  upon  evidence  satisfactory  to 
the  Post  Office  Department  of  the  efficiency  and  faithfulness 
of  the  employee  during  the  preceding  year,''  and  that  "the 
Post  Office  Department  may  reduce  a  clerk  from  a  higher  to  a 
lower  grade  whenever  his  efficiency  falls  below  a  fair  stand- 
ard or  whenever  necessary  for  purposes  of  discipline."  When 
a  clerk  or  carrier  has  been  reduced  in  salary  he  may  be  restored 
to  his  former  grade  or  advanced  to  an  intermediate  grade  at 
the  beginning  of  any  quarter  following  the  reduction,  on  evi- 
dence that  his  record  has  been  satisfactory  during  the  inter- 
vening period.  When  a  clerk  or  carrier  fails  of  promotion  be- 
cause of  unsatisfactory  service  he  may  be  promoted  at  the 
beginning  of  the  second  quarter  thereafter,  or  of  any  subse- 
quent quarter,  on  evidence  that  his  record  has  been  satisfac- 
tory during  the  intervening  period.  Clerks  and  carriers  of  the 
highest  grade  in  their  respective  offices  shall  be  eligible  for 
promotion  to  the  higher  positions  in  said  post  offices.-  In  the 
railway  mail  service,  in  addition  to  a  similar  classification,  it 
was  specifically  provided  by  act  of  1912  ^  that  "clerks  in  Class 
A  shall  be  promoted  successively  to  Class  B,  and  clerks  in  Class 
B  shall  be  promoted  to  Class  C,"  and  the  restriction  is  imposed 
upon  making  any  other  advances  in  grade  by  the  Postmaster 
General  that  "in  filling  positions  below  that  of  chief  clerk 
no  clerk  shall  be  advanced  more  than  one  grade  in  a  period  of 
a  year."  In  passing  upon  the  efficiency  of  the  several  em- 
ployees for  the  purpose  of  withholding  the  increases  from 
those  who  have  not  attained  a  fair  standard  of  "efficiency 
and  faithfulness"  the  Department  does  not  rely  entirely  upon 
the  record  of  actual  performance  of  the  employee  during  the 

^Typical  gradings  are  assistant  superintendent  of  delivery,  $1,200, 
$1,300,  $1,400,  $1,500,  $1,600,  $1,700,  $1,800,  $2,000,  $2,400:  superintendent 
of  carriers,  $1,000,  $1,100,  $1,200,  $1,300,  $1,400,  $1,500,  $1,600,  $1,700, 
$1,800,  $2,100,  $2,500. 

'Act  of  March  2,  1907,  34  Stat.  1206. 

'Act  of  August  24,  1912,  2>7  Stat.  556. 


488  THE  FEDERAL  SERMCE 

preceding  year  but  subjects  certain  classes  of  employees  to 
periodical  tests  of  efficiency  (particularly  tests  in  speed  and 
accuracy  in  sorting  and  classifying  mail)  by  the  results  of 
which  the  efficiency  rating  upon  which  the  salary  increase  is 
made  is  largely  determined. 

A  factor  which  helps  to  make  possible  the  enforcement  in 
the  postal  service  of  an  impersonal  standard  of  efficiency  is 
the  enormous  size  of  the  organization.  The  formulation  of 
a  policy  of  this  kind  is  in  the  hands  of  officers  far  removed 
from  contact  with  the  personnel  actually  affected  by  it,  and 
indeed  equally  far  removed  from  the  subordinate  administra- 
tive officers  who  are  commanded  to  carry  out  the  policy,  and 
who  are  thus  impelled  by  and  may  plead  the  superior  force  of 
a  higher  and  unappeasable  authority.  Still  another  element 
in  the  Post  Office  situation  of  which  account  must  be  taken 
is  that  the  work  is  of  a  standardized  nature,  so  that  individual 
inefficiency  is  very  clearly  and  unmistakably  discernible. 

Aside  from  the  postal  service,  the  only  other  branch  of 
the  service  in  which  a  semi-automatic  system  of  salary  increases 
prevails  is  that  of  the  assistant  examiners  of  the  Patent  Office, 
of  whom  there  are  now  380  allowed  by  law.  These  are  in 
four  grades,  receiving  compensation  rates  of  $2,400,  $2,100, 
$1,800  and  $1,500  respectively.  The  number  of  positions  in 
each  grade  is  the  same  and  is  fixed  by  law.  It  is  thus  not 
possible  for  an  automatic  system  of  advancement  from  one 
grade  to  the  next  at  regular  periods  to  be  applied.  Advance- 
ment can  be  had  only  when  a  vacancy  occurs  in  the  higher 
grade ;  and,  when  such  vacancy  occurs,  the  advancement  of 
one  of  the  examiners  in  the  lower  grade  to  the  higher  grade  is 
invariable,  the  selection  being  determined  by  a  rating  which 
is  the  resultant  of  the  factors  of  previous  efficiency,  length 
of  service,  and  the  rating  received  on  a  competitive  examina- 
tion open  to  all  members  of  the  grade.  The  precise  way  in 
which  these  three  factors  are  combined  is  of  less  interest  than 
the  fact  that  the  examination  is  not  necessarily  related  to  the 
precise  technical  subject  matter  of  the  examiner's  duties,  since 
this  is  usually  different  for  each  one,  but  rather  to  patent  prac- 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  489 

tice  and  law  generally,  so  that  it  furnishes  no  proper  test  of 
the  efficiency  in  the  past  of  the  several  examiners. 

It  might  be  thought  that  this  system  is  not  a  system 
of  salary  increases  but  rather  of  promotions,  inasmuch  as  an 
examiner  receiving  $2,400,  is  presumably  doing  a  higher  grade 
of  work  than  is  the  examiner  receiving  only  $1,500.  This  is 
manifestly  so,  but  the  system  is  nevertheless  one  of  salary 
increases  for  the  reason  that  the  four  salary  rates  do  not  cor- 
respond to  any  clearly  defined  dififerences  in  duty  or  in  the 
difficulty  of  the  work  assigned.  This  is  conclusively  demon- 
strated by  the  fact  that  an  examiner  may  wait  for  years  for 
a  vacancy  in  the  higher  grade,  all  the  time  doing  a  given  class 
of  work  which  may  in  fact  be  as  high  as  that  performed  by 
some  or  many  of  the  examiners  in  the  next  grade.  The  per- 
formance of  the  duties  does  not  in  and  of  itself  carry  the 
higher  compensation,  and  when  an  examiner  advances  from 
one  grade  to  the  next  there  may  not  be  either  then  or  subse- 
quently any  change  in  his  duties.  Indeed,  even  when  rated 
in  Grade  3,  certainly  in  Grade  2,  he  may  be  performing  duties 
as  difficult  and  responsible  as  it  is  possible  for  an  assistant  ex- 
aminer even  of  Grade  i  to  perform. 

Over  the  remainder  of  the  federal  service  no  general  sys- 
tem of  salary  increases,  whether  automatic  or  semi-automatic, 
is  in  existence.  Over  all  the  enormous  clerical,  technical,  and 
specialized  employments,  outside  the  areas  already  mentioned, 
the  question  of  compensation  increases  is,  in  almost  all  cases, 
still  handled  in  the  unsystematic  primitive  manner  which  has 
been  described  above  as  being  characteristic  of  small  and 
struggling  organizations.  With  respect  to  statutory  positions, 
as  has  already  been  pointed  out,  increases  can  be  made  only 
when  Congress,  or  rather  the  appropriations  committee,  per- 
mits. Within  the  area  where  administrative  officers  have  dis- 
cretion in  the  fixing  of  compensation  rates,  it  cannot  be  said 
that  much  progress  has  been  made  toward  the  development 
of  an  ordered  system  of  increases.  These  officers  are,  needless 
to  say,  in  the  absence  of  Congressional  cooperation  or  author- 
ity, under  grave  disadvantages  in  attempting  to  develop  any, 


490  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

such  methods.  In  most  services,  the  estabhshment  of  such 
a  system  will  involve,  for  a  period,  an  increase  in  the  size  of 
the  payroll  and  consequently  in  the  size  of  the  appropriation 
required.  Not  only  has  Congress  not  authorized  any  such 
program,  but  it  has  definitely  prohibited  it  by  the  enactment 
in  1912  of  the  act  already  referred  to,^  providing  that  "no 
part  of  the  money  appropriated  in  lump  sum  shall  be  available 
for  the  payment  of  personal  service  at  a  rate  of  compensa- 
tion in  excess  of  that  paid  for  the  same  or  similar  services 
during  the  preceding  fiscal  year." 

Recommendation  of  the  Reclassification  Commission  Re- 
garding Salary  Increases.-— In  considering  this  phase  of  the 
personnel  problem  it  is  important  to  note  that  no  satis- 
factory system  of  salary  increases,  whether  automatic  or  based 
upon  determined  eflficiency,  can  be  established,  until  the  whole 
problem  of  classification  and  standardization  of  positions  and 
salaries  has  been  solved.  The  pending  reclassifica'tion  of  the 
service  at  Washington,  and  the  hoped-for  extension  of  the 
reclassification  to  the  field  services,  will  make  possible  the 
institution  of  the  automatic  increase  in  many  branches  of 
the  service  in  which,  up  to  the  present,  it  has  been  almost  a 
technical  impossibility,  even  in  the  absence  of  financial  limita- 
tions. 

The  recommendations  of  the  Reclassification  Commission 
with  respect  to  salary  increases  within  grades  in  the  Washing- 
ton service  are  summarized  in  the  following  quotations  from 
its  report : 

The  Commission  recommends  that  hereafter  appointments 
to  positions  in  the  Washington  service  be  made  at  the  mini- 
mum rates  provided  by  the  schedules  of  compensation  applying 
to  the  respective  classes  of  positions;  that  the  compensation 
of  an  employee  in  no  case  be  increased  beyond  the  maximum 
prescribed  for  his  position,  and  that  periodical  increases  in 
the  rates  of  compensation  of  employees  within  the  ranges  pre- 
scribed for  their  respective  positions  be  made  from  rate  to  rate 
as  set  forth  in  the  respective  schedules,  upon  recommendation 

'Act  of  August  26,  1912  {Z7  Stat.  626)  as  amended  by  act  of  March 
4,  1913  ^Z7  Stat.  790). 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  491 

by  the  head  of  the  department,  bureau,  or  independent  estab- 
lishment, a])proved  by  the  Classification  Agency,  such  approval 
to  be  based  on  the  evidence  of  current  efficiency  records  or 
such  other  testimony  as  the  Classification  Agency  may  require 
to  the  effect  that  the  employee  has  rendered  service  of  a  sat- 
isfactory standard  and  has  increased  his  usefulness  to  the 
Government  since  the  date  of  his  last  advance  in  pay.  In  the 
case  of  schedules  where  no  intermediate  rates  are  prescribed, 
the  Commission  recommends  that  the  time  of  increases  in  pay 
and  the  amounts  of  such  increases  be  based  on  the  recom- 
mendation of  the  department  head,  the  approval  of  the  Clas- 
sification Agency  also  to  be  required  in  each  case.^ 

The  Commission  believes  that  the  classification  which  it  is 
recommending  will  not  only  bring  about  a  standardization  of 
duties  and  compensation,  but  will  make  possible  the  application 
of  a  progressive  policy  in  the  advancement  of  employees  which 
will  put  new  life  and  efficiency  into  the  entire  service.  In 
nearly  all  of  the  classes,  suggested  minimum,  maximum  and 
intermediate  rates  of  compensation  are  provided.  It  is  the 
belief  of  the  Commission  that  an  employee  on  entering  any 
class  should  be  paid  the  minimum  rate  prescribed  for  that 
class,  and  should  be  advanced  through  the  intermediate  rates 
to  the  maximum  only  on  the  basis  of  demonstrated  efficiency. 
Furthermore,  the  Commission  believes  that  with  successive  sal- 
ary advancements,  the  standard  of  required  efficiency  should 
be  increased  so  as  to  enable  only  the  most  efficient  employees 
to  secure  the  maximum  rate.  Thus,  if  four  rates  of  pay  were 
provided  for  a  given  class,  an  efficiency  rating  of  80  per  cent 
might  be  required  for  advancement  from  the  minimum  to 
the  next  higher  rate,  85  per  cent  to  the  next  higher,  and  90 
per  cent  to  the  maximum.  Failure  on  the  part  of  any  em- 
ployee to  maintain  the  standard  of  efficiency  set  for  the  rate 
being  paid  should  be  followed  by  his  reduction  to  a  lower  sal- 
ary rate  in  the  same  class  the  rate  to  be  determined  by  his 
efficiency  rating ;  while  failure  at  any  time  to  maintain  a  mini- 
mum standard  of  efficiency  as  prescribed  by  the  Civil  Service 
Commission,  should  be  followed  by  dismissal.^ 

It  will  be  noted  that  the  Reclassification  Commission  pro- 
poses that  the  Civil  Service  Commission  shall  be  satisfied,  in 
each  case,  that  an  employee  has  reached  the  required  standard 

^Report  of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  Part  I,  p.  71. 
'Ibid.,  p.  123. 


492  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

of  efficiency  before  increase  of  compensation  is  granted.  The 
Reclassification  Commission  does  not  make  any  suggestions 
as  to  how  this  responsibility  is  to  be  discharged.  It  would 
seem  that  the  most  that  the  Commission  could  do  would  be 
to  exercise  a  general  supervision  over  the  procedure  and  the 
standards  enforced  in  the  several  departments  in  the  main- 
tenance of  efficiency  records ;  and  that  the  question  as  to  whether 
any  particular  individual  had  or  had  not  attained  the  re- 
quired standard  of  efficiency,  would  have  to  be  determined 
by  the  efficiency  record  established  by  the  department. 
Liability  to  Demotion  and  Dismissal  as  a  Means  of  Pro- 
moting Individual  Efficiency. — From  the  negative  side  the 
most  important  means  for  insuring  individual  efficiency  lies 
in  the  possession  by  those  in  authority  of  the  power  to  demote 
or  dismiss  those  employees  who  do  not  perform  their  work 
satisfactorily.  This  means  of  control  is  effective,  however, 
only  if  it  is  rigidly  exercised  when  circumstances  warrant.  In 
private  undertakings  for  gain  few  difficulties  lie  in  the  way 
of  such  exercise.  Not  only  does  the  profit  element  consti- 
tute a  strong  incentive  to  its  use,  but  those  upon  whom  re- 
sponsibility for  action  rests  as  a  rule~do  not  have  to  secure 
the  approval  of  any  superior  authority  and  only  rarely  have 
to  justify  their  action.  In  a  government  conditions  are 
radically  different.  Not  only  is  the  profit  element  usually 
absent,  but  those  directly  in  charge  of  operations  are  rarely 
free  to  act,  due  to  the  fact  that  superior  sanction  must  often 
be  obtained. 

It  results  from  this  that  it  is  exceedingly  difficult  to  se- 
cure from  public  administration  anything  like  the  exercise 
of  the  power  of  demotion  or  dismissal  that  conditions  in  the 
several  services  more  than  warrant.  It  is  open  knowledge 
that  many  employees  who  are  notoriously  incompetent  and  in- 
efficient are  retained  on  the  rolls,  though  the  character  of 
their  work  is  well  known  by  those  in  charge  of  them. 

One  of  the  changes  urgently  needed  in  the  federal  service, 
therefore,  is  the  taking  of  those  steps  which  will  tend  to  in- 
sure a  more  vigorous  exercise  of  the  disciplinary  power. 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  493 

The  problem  is  one  that  must  be  attacked  from  a  number 
of  standpoints.  One  of  the  factors  miHtating  against  a  proper 
use  of  this  power  at  the  present  time,  consists  in  the  fact 
that  in  the  federal  service  the  power  of  removal  is  vested, 
for  the  most  part,  in  the  head  of  the  department  rather  than 
in  the  bureau  chief.  Since  the  conditions  and  necessities  of 
the  public  service  are  not  those  that,  in  any  case,  make  for  a 
firm  exercise  of  the  removal  power,  the  investment  of  the 
head  of  the  department  rather  than  the  bureau  head  with 
the  final  legal  authority  for  removal  constitutes  a  division  of 
responsibility  which  still  further  lessens  the  probability  that 
the  power  will  be  vigorously  exercised.  The  situation  is  well 
illustrated  in  the  case  of  a  local  employee  who  is  appointed 
by  the  head  of  the  department.  The  final  responsibility  for  his 
removal  rests  not  on  the  local  chief  nor  yet  upon  the  chief  of 
the  bureau  at  Washington,  but  upon  the  secretary  of  the  de- 
partment. Thus  the  local  chief  and  the  chief  of  the  bureau 
are  each  in  turn  relieved  of  the  necessity  for  final  action 
and  may  shift  that  responsibility  to  their  superiors.  The  net 
result  is  a  system  of  circumlocution  and  delay  in  handling 
questions  of  reduction  and  removal  which  is  one  of  the  dis- 
tinguishing defects  of  the  federal  personnel  system. 

To  all  these  factors  making  for  a  lack  of  firmness  and 
vigor  in  the  exercise  of  the  power  of  removal  and  reduction 
is  added  the  intervention  of  political  or  personal  influence  on 
behalf  of  the  employee  affected.  It  is  here  that  Congressional 
influence  is  invoked  particularly  with  a  regularity  not  found 
with  respect  to  any  other  phase  of  personnel  administration. 
While  some  Congressmen  are  able  to  resist  the  importunities 
of  their  constituents  who  seek  appointment,  promotion,  trans- 
fer, or  the  like,  it  is  rarely  indeed  that  a  Congressman  will 
not  interest  fiimself  seriously  in  the  case  of  a  constituent 
who  has  been  dismissed  or  reduced  or  is  threatened  with  dis- 
missal or  reduction.  Instances  are  not  unknown  in  which 
the  entire  Congressional  delegation  (both  Senate  and  House) 
from  a  State  has  intervened  personally  on  behalf  of  a  dis- 
missed employee.     Against   this   form  of   intervention   it   is 


494   .  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

difficult  to  provide  in  the  removal  procedure  itself.  The 
remedy  here  lies,  as  has  been  urged  in  the  chapter  dealing 
with  political  interference,  in  positive  and  express  statutory 
prohibition  against  such  interference. 

A  device  that  has  l^een  found  highly  useful  in  some  juris- 
dictions has  been  that  of  vesting  the  power  of  removal  over 
subordinate  employees,  concurrently  with  the  power  possessed 
by  the  administrative  officer,  in  the  Civil  Service  Commission 
or  other  central  personnel  agency,  such  power  to  be  ex- 
ercised, however,  only  upon  the  complaint  of  a  citizen.  Under 
this  procedure  any  citizen  having  cause  of  complaint  against 
an  employee  may  file  such  complaint,  if  he  choose,  with  the 
central  personnel  agency  instead  of  with  the  administrative 
superior  of  the  employee,  and  that  agency  may  proceed  to 
investigate  the  case  and  to  remove,  reduce,  suspend,  or  other- 
wise discipline  the  employee.  Testimony  seems  to  be  unani- 
mous that  this  procedure  has  been  found  very  useful  whenever 
it  has  been  employed. 

It  is  clear  that  this  method  is  applicable  only  to  the  rela- 
tively small  portion  of  the  personnel  that  comes  into  contact 
with  the  public  in  some  way.  The  proportion  of  employees 
to  whom  it  would  apply  is  probably  smaller  in  the  federal 
service  than  in  most  of  the  municipal  jurisdictions  in  which 
it  has  been  applied.  Nevertheless  there  are  large  areas  of  the 
federal  service  to  which  it  would  be  aj:)plica1)le.  and  it  is  diffi- 
cult to  think  of  any  reason  why  it  should  not  be  applied  to 
them,  at  least  experimentally. 

Finally  it  should  be  noted  that  whatever  reluctance  is 
now  found  among  administrative  officers  to  exercise  vigorously 
the  power  of  removal  and  reduction  is  not  due  to  any  statutory 
limitation  on,  or  impediment  to,  the  exercise  of  that  power. 
There  is  a  notion  abroad — and  it  might  be  remarked  that  the 
same  erroneous  impression  prevails  with  respect  to  the  civil 
service  laws  of  most  jurisdictions — that  existing  statutory 
provisions  place  clear  restrictions  upon  the  power  of  the 
administrative  officer  in  dismissal  and  reduction.  Nothing 
could  be  further  from  the  truth.     As  will  appear  directly,  the 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  495 

power  of  the  administrative  officer  to  dismiss  and  reduce  an 
employee  is,  throughout  the  service,  for  practical  purposes, 
as  untrammeled  as  is  that  of  the  ordinary  business  executive, 
except  in  so  far  as  the  power  is  located  at  a  higher  level  in 
the  organization  than  is  common  in  business  organizations, 
a  point  to  which  reference  has  been  made  already. 
Existing  Law  and  Regulations  Governing  Dismissals. — 
The  civil  service  law  itself  makes  no  requirement  as  to  the 
procedure  to  be  followed  in  removal.  Indeed  the  only  men- 
tion which  it  makes  of  the  matter  of  removal  is  in  connection 
with  political  assessments.  It  forbids  any  "officer  or  employee 
of  the  United  States  mentioned  in  this  act,"  that  is,  a  Sen- 
ator, Representative,  territorial  delegate  of  the  Congress,  or 
Senator-,  Representative-  or  delegate-elect,  or  any  officer  or 
employee  of  either  House,  or  any  executive,  judicial,  military, 
or  naval  officers  of  the  United  States,  or  any  clerk  or  em- 
ployee in  any  department,  branch,  or  bureau  of  the  executive, 
judicial,  military,  or  naval  services  of  the  United  States,  to 
"discharge,  promote,  or  degrade,  or  in  any  manner  change  the 
official  rank  or  compensation  of  any  other  officer  or  employee 
or  promise  or  threaten  to  do  so,  for  giving  or  withholding  or 
neglecting  to  make  any  contribution  of  money  or  other  valu- 
able thing  for  any  political  purpose."  ^ 

The  civil  service  rules  carry  this  prohibition  somewhat 
further.  Thus  the  revision  of  the  rules  promulgated  May 
6,  1896,  provided  that 

No  person  in  the  executive  civil  service  shall  dismiss  or 
cause  to  be  dismissed,  or  make  any  attempt  to  procure  the  dis- 
missal of,  or  in  any  manner  change  the  official  rank  or  com- 
pensation of,  any  other  person  therein  because  of  his  political 
or  religious  opinions  or  affiliations. 

And  the  present  rules  provide  that 

In  making  removals  or  reductions,  and  in  other  punish- 
ment, like  penalties  shall  be  imposed  for  like  offenses,  and  no 
discrimination  shall  be  exercised  for  political  or  religious  rea- 
sons. 

*  Section  13,  now  embodied  in  Section  120,  Criminal  Code. 


496  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

In  1897  there  was  added  to  the  rules  for  the  first  time  a 
provision  specifying  a  procedure  to  be  followed  in  making 
removals.^  This  provision  which,  unlike  the  merely  directory 
provison  above  cited,  applied  only  to  the  removals  from  com- 
petitive positions,  called  for  the  reasons  for  removal  to 
be  given  in  writing,  together  with  notice  and  opportunity  for 
answer  and  the  entry  of  the  whole  on  the  official  records. - 

This  provision  remained  in  force  only  a  few  years.  In 
1905  the  requirement  of  notice,  reasons  in  writing,  and  oppor- 
tunity to  answer  was  limited  to  cases  in  which  the  removal 
was  made  by  an  officer  subordinate  to  the  head  of  the  depart- 
ment.^ The  change  was  made  by  President  Roosevelt  as  the 
result  of  his  witnessing  an  act  of  misconduct  by  an  employee 
which  he  regarded  as  so  gross  as  not  to  merit  even  the  rather 
slight  protective  procedure  required  by  the  rules. ^ 

In  191 2  the  procedure  required  by  the  rule  of  1897  was 
again  restored,  with  the  additional  provision  that  copy  of  the 
records  of  the  case  should  be  furnished  to  the  Civil  Service 
Commission  on  request.  In  the  same  year,  substantially  the 
wording  of  the  rule  was  enacted  into  law  by  Congress.     The 

*  Three  years  before  (on  June  28,  1894),  Postmaster  General  W.  S. 
Bissell  had  issued  a  similar  order  covering  the  removal  of  carriers  in  free 
delivery  offices. 

'  This  provision,  promulgated  July  27,  1897,  as  Section  8  of  Rule  2 
reads  as  follows:  "No  removal  shall  be  made  from  the  competitive 
classified  service  except  for  just  cause  and  for  reasons  given  in  writing; 
and  the  person  sought  to  be  removed  shall  have  notice  and  be  furnished 
a  copy  of  such  reasons,  and  be  allowed  a  reasonable  time  for  person- 
ally answering  the  same  in  writing.  Copy  of  such  reasons,  notice,  and 
answer  and  of  the  order  of  removal  shall  be  made  a  part  of  the  records 
of  the  proper  Department  or  office." 

By  a  "declaration  of  the  meaning"  of  this  section  officially  promul- 
gated by  President  Roosevelt  in  1902,  it  was  declared  "that  the  term 
'just  cause,'  as  used  in  section  8,  Civil  Service  Rule  II,  is  intended  to 
mean  any  cause,  other  than  one  merely  political  or  religious,  which 
will  promote  the  efficiency  of  the  service  ;  and  notliing  contained  in  said 
rule  shall  be  construed  to  require  the  examination  of  witnesses  or  any 
trial  or  hearing  except  in  the  discretion  of  the  officer  making  the  re- 
moval." 

Subsequently  the  Commission  held  that  three  days  would  satisfy  the 
requirement  of  a  "reasonable  time"  for  the  employee  to  answer. 

^  This  rule  referred  to  removal  by  the  President  in  the  same  terms 
as  removal  by  the  head  of  a  department,  but  there  has  never  been  any 
competitive  position  to  which  appointment,  and  hence  removal,  has  been 
made  by  the  President. 

*  Foulke,  Fighting  the  Spoilsmen,  p.  174. 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  497 

wording  of  this  provision,  which  appears  in  the  act  of  August 
24,  1912/  is  as  follows: 

That  no  person  in  the  classified  service  of  the  United  States 
shall  be  removed  therefrom  except  for  such  cause  as  will  pro- 
mote the  efficiency  of  said  service  and  for  reasons  given  in 
writing,  and  the  person  whose  removal  is  sought  shall  have 
notice  of  the  same  and  of  any  charges  preferred  against  him, 
and  be  furnished  with  a  copy  thereof,  and  also  be  allowed  a 
reasonable  time  for  personally  answering  the  same  in  writing; 
and  affidavits  in  support  thereof;  but  no  examination  of  wit- 
nesses nor  any  trial  or  hearing  shall  be  required  except  in  the 
discretion  of  the  officer  making  the  removal ;  and  copies  of 
charges,  notice  of  hearing,  answer,  reasons  for  removal,  and 
of  the  order  of  removal  shall  be  made  a  part  of  the  records  of 
the  proper  department  or  office,  as  shall  also  the  reasons  for 
reduction  in  rank  or  compensation ;  and  copies  of  the  same 
shall  be  furnished  to  the  person  affected  upon  request,  and  the 
Civil  Service  Commission  also  shall,  upon  request,  be  furnished 
copies  of  the  same:  .  .  . 

It  will  be  noted  that  this  provision  applies  to  persons  in 
"the  classified  service,"  whereas  the  rules  which  preceded  this 
statute  referred  only  to  persons  in  "the  competitive  classified 
service.''  It  was  shortly  held,  however,  by  the  Attorney  Gen- 
eral that  the  statute  did  not  embrace  any  wider  class  than  did 
the  former  rules,  that  "the  term  'classified  civil  service,'  in  sec- 
tion 6  of  the  act  of  August  24,  19 12,  was  used  in  the  more  pop- 
ular sense  of  the  competitive  service;  and,  therefore,  should  not 
be  held  to  include  excepted  positions,  unless  such  positions  have 
been  filled  as  competitive  positions  are  filled,  in  which  event, 
under  Rule  II,  paragraph  3,  of  the  Civil  Service  Rules,  the 
person  appointed  is  entitled  to  all  the  rights  of  a  competi- 
tive employee.     (30  Opinions  Attorney  General,  181.)" 

The  wording  of  this  statute  merits  close  attention,  especially 
in  view  of  the  erroneous  notion  not  infrequently  encountered 
that  the  law  requires  a  formal  trial,  involving  a  more  or  less 
judicial  procedure.  It  calls  for  no  taking  of  testimony  nor 
does  it  set  up  any  requirement  as  to  the  sufficiency  of  the 

^2,7  Stat.  555. 


498  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

evidence  upon  which  removal  is  made.  It  affords  the  employee 
no  protection  against  removal  other  than  the  moral  security 
which  he  derives  from  the  fact  that  an  administrative  officer 
will  hesitate  before  committing  to  the  departmental  records 
an  unfounded  charge  against  an  employee.^  It  may  be  said 
with  entire  accuracy,  therefore,  that  the  law  in  its  present 
state  offers  no  obstacle  to  the  removal  of  an  employee  for  in- 
efficiency and  that  responsibility  for  failure  to  make  such 
removal  or  reduction,  where  there  has  been  such  failure,  rests 
wholly  upon  the  administrative  officer. 

In  those  branches  of  the  unclassified  service,  other  than 
laborers,  to  which  formal  systems  of  selection  have  been  ex- 
tended there  are  found  at  present  no  restrictions  upon  removal. 
Since  appointment  in  all  these  cases  is  in  the  hands  of  the 
President  and  removal  is,  therefore,  likewise  in  his  hands,  none 
of  the  restrictions,  whether  of  the  civil  service  act  or  of  the 
rules  prohibiting  removal  for  political  or  religious  reasons, 
apply."  The  protection  against  removal  in  these  services,  there- 
fore, is  wholly  moral  and  traditional.  Up  to  the  present  time 
there  has  been  no  evidence  that  this  protection  is  insufficient 
and  it  would  seem  superfluous  to  attempt  to  suggest  any  change 
on  this  point.  It  is  worth  noting  that  the  committee  on  the 
foreign  service  of  the  National  Civil  Service  Reform  League 
made  no  suggestion  on  this  head  in  its  recent  report. 

The  situation  in  the  presidential  postmasterships  varies 
from  that  in  the  foreign  service  and  in  the  Public  Health 

^  The  popular  misconception  as  to  the  effect  of  this  statute  sometimes 
is  so  extreme  that  it  is  thought  that  the  employee  has  the  right  to  invoke 
a  judicial  review  of  the  action  of  the  administrative  officer  in  removing 
Fiim.  There  is  absolutely  no  warrant  for  this  belief.  Should  the  ad- 
ministrative officer  choose  to  make  a  wholly  unfounded  charge  against 
an  employee  and  remove  him  on  the  basis  of  such  charge,  even  if  the 
employee's  reply  to  such  charge,  filed  before  removal,  were  ever  so  con- 
clusive, there  is  no  way  whatever  in  which  the  action  of  the  officer  may 
be  submitted  to  a  judicial  review  (or  even  to  the  review  of  any  superior 
administrative  authority — unless  provision  for  such  review  is  made  by 
the  department  itself). 

'  It  will  be  recalled  that  the  officers  enumerated  in  the  civil  service 
act  who  are  prohibited  from  promoting,  reducing,  or  dismissing  employees 
because  of  giving  or  refusing  political  contributions,  does  not  include  the 
President,  and  as  already  suggested,  it  is  questionable  whether  it  would  be 
constitutional  for  Congress  to  impose  such  a  restriction  upon  the  President. 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  499 

Service  in  that  there  is  a  statutory  term  of  four  years  at  the 
end  of  which  the  department  (through  recommendation  to  the 
President)  may  remove,  in  effect,  by  faihng  to  reappoint.  The 
aboHtion  of  the  four-year  term  has  been  urged  already. 

With  respect  to  unskilled  laborers,  the  moral  mandate  of 
the  civil  service  law  and  rules  applies,  but  the  statute  of  191 2 
does  not.  Procedure  designed  to  safeguard  against  abuse  of 
the  removal  power  is  confined  to  that  provided  by  the  regula- 
tions for  federal  offices  outside  of  Washington.  The  regu- 
lation on  this  point  is  as  follows : 

Sec.  I.  No  laborer  shall  be  removed  except  for  such  cause  as, 
in  the  judgment  of  the  head  of  the  office,  will  pro- 
mote the  efficiency  of  the  service,  and  no  trial  or  hear- 
ing shall  be  required  except  at  the  discretion  of  the 
officer  making  the  removal. 

Sec.  2.  The  reasons  for  any  removal  shall  be  made  of  record 
in  the  office  in  which  the  person  is  serving,  and  shall 
be  open  to  the  inspection  of  the  board  and  the  com- 
mission. 

It  will  be  observed  that  this  provision  does  not,  like  the 
provision  in  the  classified  service,  require  notice  to  the  employee 
or  an  opportunity  for  making  answer,  but  merely  requires  that 
the  reasons  for  removal  shall  be  made  of  record. 

Whether  or  not  the  regulations  just  quoted  furnish  as  full 
a  measure  of  protection  against  the  improper  removal  of  la- 
borers as  might  be  desirable,  there  seems  no  reason  why  they 
should  not  be  applied  to  the  entire  labor  service.  Certainly 
there  is  no  reason  for  exempting  Washington,  where  laborers 
are  employed  under  competitive  methods,  from  the  meager 
requirement  that  the  reasons  for  removal  shall  be  made  of 
record,  and  it  is  difficult  to  see  why  even  those  cities  to  which 
the  regulations  for  competitive  selection  have  not  yet  been 
applied  should  be  excepted  from  this  requirement. 

In  considering  whether  in  this  state  of  law,  an  adequate 
degree  of  protection  is  afforded  to  the  employee  against  re- 
moval for  political  or  personal  reasons,  it  would  be  futile; 
to  attempt  to  formulate  a  theoretical  standard  for  judgment. 


Soo  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Under  ideal  conditions  there  would  be  no  temptation  or  in- 
clination on  the  part  of  the  administrative  officer  to  abuse  his 
power.  What  is  required  is  a  shaping  of  the  procedure  that 
will  guard  effectively  against  the  actual  danger  of  unjust  re- 
moval as  it  is  now  found  in  the  federal  service.  Viewed 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  service  as  a  whole,  embracing  in 
that  term  the  individual  employees,  it  is  far  better  that  the 
power  of  removal  and  reduction  be  vigorously  exercised,  even 
if  occasionally  an  employee  is  dismissed  or  reduced  in  a  doubt- 
ful case.  If  the  procedure  prevents  flagrant  abuse  of  the 
power  of  removal  and  reduction,  it  is  sufficient. 

Where  the  chief  administrative  officers  are  political,  and 
where  political,  and  particularly  Congressional,  intervention  is 
permitted,  it  is  impossiljle  to  safeguard  the  removal  procedure 
absolutely  against  political  removals  without  unduly  restricting 
the  administrative  officer.  When  the  administrative  officers 
are  selected  on  a  merit  basis,  political  intervention  effectively 
checked,  and  political  activity  by  employees  prohibited,  there 
will  be  for  practical  purposes  no  danger  of  political  removals 
and  reductions  to  guard  against.  In  point  of  fact,  the  danger 
of  political  removals  has  been  very  largely  eliminated  already 
in  the  federal  service.  In  part  this  is  due  to  legal,  in  part 
to  purely  moral  or  traditional,  factors. 

In  the  competitive  service,  moreover,  ample  protection 
against  purely  political  removal  lies  in  the  fact  that  the  superior 
has  little  or  no  choice  in  the  selection  of  the  successor  of  the 
dismissed  employee.  The  same  is  true,  though  perhaps  less 
unqualifiedly,  in  the  case  of  laborers.  It  is  still  more  true  in 
the  case  of  presidential  postmasters,  because  selection,  under 
the  present  order,  is  ordinarily  restricted  to  the  highest  eligil)le.^ 
In  the  case  of  the  foreign  service  and  of  the  Public  Health 
Service  this  factor  is  not  present,  but  the  tradition  of  perma- 
nence and  non-partisanship  is  already  so  highly  developed  in 
those  services  that  the  removal  of  one  in  the  service  merely 
to  make  a  vacancy  is  hardly  within  the  bounds  of  possibility. 

*  President  Harding's  new  Order  of  May  lo,  1921,  permits  the  Post- 
master General  to  select  from  the  three  highest. 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  501 

In  short,  It  may  be  said  that,  while  poHtical  removals  may 
still  occur  in  rare  instances,  the  danger  of  such  removal  is 
too  slight  to  call  for  any  severe  additional  restriction  upon 
the  removal  power  of  administrative  officers,  a  power  which, 
as  already  seen,  has  been  in  the  virtual  absence  of  restriction, 
all  too  feebly  and  infrequently  exercised. 

With  respect  to  the  need  for  protection  against  removal 
merely  for  reasons  of  personal  dislike,  the  question  is  perhaps 
a  little  more  debatable.  Doubtless  an  instance  in  which  a 
thoroughly  competent  employee  would  be  removed  for  such 
a  cause  is  virtually  unknown;  but  there  are  always  a  certain 
number  of  border-line  cases  in  which  the  justice  of  removal 
for  inefficiency  is  an  open  question,  and  here  the  personal 
likes  and  dislikes  of  the  administrative  officer  may  find  some 
field  for  play.  Nevertheless,  even  here  the  danger  appears  so 
slight  that  it  would  seem  better  to  continue  to  incur  it  rather 
than  to  furnish  administrative  officers  with  any  material  addi- 
tional excuses  for  neglecting  to  make  necessary  removals  or 
reductions. 

In  the  postal  service  there  has  been  brought  into  promi- 
nence a  third  improper  cause  for  removal  against  which  pro- 
tection must  be  provided.  This  is  removal  for  activity  in 
employees'  organizations.  There  is  no  rule  in  the  postal 
service  prohibiting  this  kind  of  activity,  and  indeed  the  statutes 
expressly  recognize  the  right  of  postal  employees  to  member- 
ship, and  therefore,  by  implication,  the  right  to  hold  office  in 
and  act  as  representative  of,  such  organizations.  Neverthe- 
less, there  has  been  a  number  of  dismissals  in  the  postal 
service  of  the  officers  of  organizations  of  postal  employees,  and 
of  their  spokesmen  before  Congressional  committees,  on 
charges  generally  believed  by  the  members  of  the  organiza- 
tions in  question  to  have  been  trumped  up. 
Possible  Machinery  for  Controlling  Exercise  of  Power  of 
Dismissal. — The  practical  devices  which  may  be  proposed 
for  further  restricting  the  power  of  removal  vested  in  the 
heads  of  departments  are  not  many.  The  most  extreme  that 
could  be  proposed  would  be  that  calling  for  a  judicial  review 


502  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

of  the  facts  from  which  any  dismissal  was  based,  such  re- 
view to  be  obtained  by  the  dismissed  employee  by  the  writ 
of  certiorari. 

Such  a  provision  is  now  actually  found  in  a  few  municipal 
jurisdictions  with  respect  to  their  police  and  fire  services,  where 
it  has  been  thought  desirable  to  protect  the  honest  policeman 
or  fireman  against  the  malevolence  of  grafting  superiors. 
There  is  no  branch  in  the  federal  service  where  such  a  re- 
striction would  be  appropriate,  and  no  suggestion  that  it  should 
be  applied  has  come  to  notice. 

A  method  much  less  extreme  than  this,  but  still  quite  se- 
vere, would  be  a  provision  under  which  a  removal  ordered  by 
the  head  of  a  department  would  be  reviewable  by  a  central 
bureau  such  as  the  Civil  Service  Commission,  This  proposal 
was  actually  made  by  the  Reclassification  Commission  in  its 
recent  report.  It  is  not  clear  whether  the  Commission  intended 
that  the  review  should  be  made  by  the  central  authority  only 
upon  the  appeal  of  the  employee  dismissed  or  whether  it  in- 
tended that  the  consent  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  or 
other  central  authority  should  be  necessary  in  every  case 
to  make  a  removal  effective. -^  The  latter  provision  would  be 
particularly  drastic,  and  it  is  hardly  believed  that  even  the  for- 
mer is  justified  Ijy  the  conditions  now  existing  in  the 
service.  The  furthest  that  such  provision  should  go  is  the 
requirement  that  administrative  officers  file  with  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  a  statement  of  the  reasons  why  employees 
are  dismissed. 

In  some  civil  service  jurisdictions  the  removal  power  has 
been  removed  entirely  from  the  hands  of  the  administrative 

*At  one  point  the  Commission  recommends  "that  employees  who  fail 
to  attain  a  current  standard  of  efficiency  be  removed  from  the  service 
after  suitable  opi)ortunity  for  appeal  to  the  Commission"  (Report,  Part  I, 
p.  125),  so  also  "Dismissal  should  also  be  resorted  to  in  cases  of  dishon- 
esty, immorality,  or  other  serious  offense  in  accordance  with  the  present 
provisions  of  law,  but  with  the  right  of  appeal  on  the  part  of  the  em- 
ployee to  the  Civil  Service  Commission"  (Report,  Part  I,  p.  128).  The  pro- 
posed law  submitted  by  the  Commission  for  enactment  reads,  however, 
that  "no  employee  shall  be  dismissed  except  in  accordance  with  the  act 
approved  August  24,  1912,  and  unless  such  dismissal  is  approved  by  the 
Commission."     (Report,  Part  I,  p.   138.) 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  503 

officers  and  vested  in  special  trial  boards,  usually  composed  of 
the  members  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  and,  in  some 
cases,  with  employee  representation.  Under  this  procedure  the 
administrative  officer  has  no  power  other  than  to  suspend  the 
employee  and  file  charges  against  him  with  the  trial  board, 
which  then  becomes  the  sole  judge  of  the  penalty  to  be  in- 
flicted, whether  removal  or  a  less  penalty.  The  principal  ex- 
ample of  this  type  of  provision  in  an  important  jurisdiction 
is  that  of  Chicago.  Opinions  have  differed  very  widely  as 
to  the  wisdom  of  this  provision,  both  in  theory  and  as  it  has 
worked  out  actually  in  Chicago  and  elsewhere.  It  has  been 
contended  by  the  advocates  of  the  system  that  it  results  in 
prompter  and  more  general  removal  of  the  inefficient  because 
it  relieves  the  administrative  officer  of  the  burden  of  ordering 
such  removals,  putting  him  merely  in  the  position  of  a  com- 
plainant, while  the  onus  of  the  final  decision  rests  upon  the 
trial  board;  and  that  this  board  is  able  to  exercise  its  power 
fearlessly  because  it  need  not  dread  incurring  the  disfavor 
of  the  employees,  since  it  does  not  require  their  future 
cooperation,  as  does  the  administrative  officer,  in  order  to  suc- 
ceed in  its  work.  On  the  other  hand,  the  opponents  of  the 
system  condemn  it  as  relieving  the  administrative  officer  of  a 
responsibility  which  should  squarely  be  his,  of  depriving  the 
energetic  and  forceful  administrator  of  the  power  of  removal 
which  he  should  have  if  he  is  to  retain  control  of  his  depart- 
ment, and  of  furnishing  the  incompetent  employee  an  elaborate 
protection  against  removal  to  which  he  is  not  entitled  and  which, 
on  the  contrary,  redounds  to  the  disadvantage  of  the  service. 
The  view  upon  the  point  last  mentioned  is  based  upon  the 
belief,  which  it  can  hardly  be  doubted  is  supported  by  experi- 
ence, that  when  a  body  is  created,  as  in  this  case,  nominally 
to  deal  out  even  handed  justice  but  actually  to  protect  the  in- 
terests of  the  employee,  almost  invariably  it  tends  to  develop 
a  bias  in  favor  of  the  employee,  so  that  the  administrative 
officer  who  prefers  charges  against  the  employee  is  likely,  when 
he  appears  before  the  board,  to  find  himself  actually  in  the 
position  of  a  defendant,  though  nominally  complainant. 


504  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

The  substance  of  the  matter  seems  to  be  that  the  formal 
trial  board  is  justified  only  when  there  exists  a  considerable 
degree  of  danger  of  political  removals.  As  already  indicated, 
it  is  not  believed  that  such  a  situation  nov;^  obtains  in  the 
federal  service.  Under  these  conditions  the  trial  board  sys- 
tem is  not  likely  to  have  any  such  value  as  will  compensate 
for  the  division  of  administrative  responsibility  which  it  en- 
tails and  the  weakening  of  the  forces,  already  far  too  weak, 
which  make  for  the  prompt  and  determined  removal  of  the  in- 
efficient. Furthermore,  the  object  aimed  at  may  be  attained 
in  a  much  more  satisfactory  manner  by  the  organization  in 
the  several  departments  and  bureaus  of  advisory  boards  made 
up  of  supervisory  officers  and  employee  representatives, 
to  whom  all  but  the  most  flagrant  cases  of  inefficiency 
or  misconduct  should  be  referred  for  examination  and  recom- 
mendation before  action  by  the  head  of  the  department 
or  other  officer  vested  with  the  power  of  removal.  These 
boards  should  not  act  in  a  judicial  capacity  in  the  sense  that 
the  complaining  officer  would  be  required  to  appear  before 
them  to  testify,  for  this  would  necessarily  tend  to  weaken 
the  desire  of  officers  to  act,  even  in  cases  clearly  calling  for 
action.  The  tribunal  should  sit  rather  in  the  capacity  of  an 
advisory  and  examining  body,  having  l:>efore  it  the  state- 
ment of  the  complaining  officer,  which  would  be  not  so  much 
in  the  nature  of  a  complaint  as  of  a  request  for  investigation. 
The  body  could  then  hear  the  employee  and  could  make  other 
informal  investigation  reaching  a  conclusion  compounded  of 
due  regard  for  the  interests  of  the  service  and  the  interests 
of  the  employee.  The  recommendation  of  such  a  body  should 
have  a  purely  advisory  status,  though  it  might  1)e  provided 
that  the  action  of  the  board  should  be  made  a  part  of  the  public 
records  of  the  department,  and  that  a  copy  of  the  prcoeedings 
should  be  forwarded  to  the  Civil  Service  Commission. 

A  procedure  such  as  this,  is  especially  desirable  in  the 
larger  services  in  which  the  contact  between  the  individual  and 
the  superior  officer  who  exercises  the  power  of  removal  or 
of  recommendation  for  removal  is  so  slight  that  it  does  not  fur- 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  505 

nish  in  or  of  itself  any  safeguard  against  arbitrary  removal. 
The  postal  service  is  an  outstanding  example  of  such  a  service; 
and  the  absence  of  any  formalized  procedure  for  the  exercising 
of  the  power  of  removal  in  this  service  has  long  been  a  source 
of  complaint  among  its  members.  In  the  programs  of  the  sev- 
eral postal  employees'  organizations  are  found  demands  for 
the  creation  in  the  several  branches  of  the  service  of  "Courts 
of  Appeal."  It  is  not  clear  whether  these  demands  con- 
template a  central  tribunal,  outside  the  department,  or  depart- 
mental tribunals  along  the  lines  here  urged. 

It  is  by  no  means  essential,  either  in  theory  or  in  prac- 
tice, that,  in  the  establishment  of  service  tribunals  of  this  kind, 
the  subordinate  employee  should  be  given  representation,  and 
there  are  practical  difficulties  in  the  way  of  giving  them  such 
representation.  Nevertheless  it  is  believed  that  if  the  func- 
tions of  these  tribunals  are  confined  within  the  limits  above 
suggested,  no  impairment  of  the  responsibility  of  the  admin- 
istration can  result  from  such  representation  while,  on  the 
other  hand,  its  effect  upon  the  morale  of  the  subordinate  per- 
sonnel is  likely  to  be  very  beneficial. 

It  is  unfortunate  that  figures  showing  the  number  of  dis- 
missals or  reductions  for  inefficiency  or  misconduct  are  not 
available.  The  departments  are  not  required  to  report  such 
action  to  the  Commission  or  to  any  central  agency  and  they 
do  not  publish  such  data  in  their  own  reports.  It  would 
.seem  desirable  that  the  civil  service  rules,  which  now  merely 
follow  the  statute  in  providing  that  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission, upon  request,  shall  be  furnished  copies  of  the  reasons 
for  removal,  should  require  that  notice  be  sent  to  it  of  every 
removal  and  also  every  reduction,  together  with  a  copy  of 
the  reasons  therefor.  Upon  the  basis  of  such  reports  the  Com- 
mission might  then  make  a  study  of  the  exercise  of  the  removal 
power  under  present  statutory  provisions  with  a  view  to  recom- 
mendation for  changes,  should  any  be  called  for. 

In  1890  Congress  imposed  upon  the  heads  of  the  several 
executive  departments  the  duty  "to  report  to  Congress  each 
year  in  the  annual  estimates  the  number  of  employees  in  each 


5o6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

bureau  and  office,  and  the  salaries  of  each,  who  are  below  a 
fair  standard  of  efficiency."  ^  This  statute,  it  will  be  observed, 
does  not  require  that  those  below  a  fair  standard  of  efficiency 
shall  be  removed  from  the  service,  but  it  is  doubtless  equivalent 
to  a  moral  mandate.-  Furthermore,  it  makes  no  distinction 
l^etween  employees  whose  inefficiency  is  due  to  age  or  physical 
infirmity  and  those  inefficient  for  other  reasons. 

In  the  reports  submitted  pursuant  to  the  statute  just  re- 
ferred to  for  the  year  ended  June  30,  1919,^  the  Secretary  of 
State  categorically  states  "that  there  are  no  employees  in  the 
Department  of  State  below  a  fair  average  of  efficiency,"  and 
the  Chairmen  of  the  Federal  Trade  Commission  and  of  the 
Federal  Board  for  Vocational  Education,  the  only  independent 
establishment  which  filed  reports  pursuant  to  the  statute  that 
year,  are  equally  positive.  The  Secretary  of  the  Treasury 
somewhat  more  modestly  submits  a  statement  from  the  chief 
clerk  of  the  Department  to  the  effect  that  the  following  offices, 
and  the  list  embraces  all  the  offices  of  the  Department,  "report 
that  there  are  no  employees  therein  who  are  below  a  fair 
standard  of  efficiency."  Similarly,  the  Secretary  of  the  Navy 
reports  that  "my  information  is  that  there  are  no  employees 
in  this  Department  below  a  fair  standard  of  efficiency,"  and 
the  Postmaster  General  states  that  "based  on  efficiency  ratings, 
there  are  no  employees  of  this  Department  who  are  below  a 
fair  standard  within  the  meaning  of  the  act."  The  Attorney 
General  states  that  "it  is  reported  that  there  are  no  employees 
in  this  Department,  so  far  as  officially  informed,  who  are 
below  a  fair  standard  of  efficiency."  Each  of  the  remaining 
executive  departments  reports  several  employees  as  being  be- 
low a  fair  standard  of  efficiency.    The  War  Department  stated 

^  Act  of  July  II,  IcSqo,  Section  2,  26  Stat.  228. 

*  In  1912,  in  providing  for  the  establishment  of  a  system  of  efficiency 
records,  to  which  more  extended  reference  has  been  made  in  connection 
with  promotion  methods,  Congress  providi'd  that  "such  system  .  .  .  shall 
also  provide  a  rating  below  which  no  employee  may  fall  without  being 
demoted  ;  it  shall  further  provide  for  a  rating  below  wliich  no  employee 
may  fall  without  being  dismissed  for  inefficiency  (y\ct  of  August  23, 
1912,  y7  Stat.  413). 

'  Found  in  Estimates  of  Appropriations  Required  for  the  Service  of 
the  Fiscal  Year  ending  June  30,  1921,  pp.  1040  ff. 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  507 

that  in  each  of  the  cases  reported  by  it  "a  reduction  in  grade 
is  contemplated."  None  of  the  other  departments  indicated 
what  action  it  proposed  to  be  taken  in  the  cases  reported  by 
them.  It  is  evident  that  the  departments  have  not  taken  this 
requirement  seriously,  and  that  no  good  is  accomplished  by  it. 

The  questions  involved  in  the  formulation  of  a  satisfactory 
procedure  for  the  reduction  to  a  lower  position  of  an  employee 
who  has  proved  himself  incompetent  are  not  different  in  any 
essential  respect  from  those  involved  in  the  problem  of  dis- 
missal. The  difference  is  one  of  degree,  reduction  being  a 
so  much  less  severe  punishment  than  dismissal  that  there  is 
correspondingly  less  need  or  justification  for  restricting  the 
discretion  of  the  administrative  officer. 

Power  to  Suspend  as  a  Means  of  Promoting  Individual 
Efficiency. — The  power  of  suspension  of  an  employee 
pending  action  on  the  question  of  his  removal  or  reduction  is 
one  which  is  indispensable  to  effective  administration.  The 
only  safeguard  which  should  be  imposed  on  the  exercise  of 
this  power  is  a  provision  limiting  the  period  of  suspension  so 
as  to  compel  a  decision  to  be  made  promptly.  Suspension  may 
be  employed  also,  however,  as  a  method  of  punishment  in 
and  of  itself  when  there  is  no  intention  to  inflict  removal  or 
reduction.  In  the  latter  case,  of  course,  there  should  also  be 
a  limitation  on  the  length  of  time  for  which  suspension  may 
be  ordered,  since  suspension  for  too  long  a  period  may  be 
tantamount  to  a  removal,  but  the  period  may  be  measurably 
longer  than  in  the  first  case  without  being  excessive. 

The  civil  service  rules  provide  that  "a  person  may  be 
suspended  for  a  period  not  to  exceed  ninety  (90)  days  .  .  . 
the  period  of  suspension  may  be  extended  beyond  ninety 
(90)  days  with  the  prior  consent  of  the  Commission."  ^  These 
time  limitations  apply  regardless  of  the  purpose  of  the  sus- 
pension. It  is  believed  that  90  days  is  an  excessive  period  of 
suspension  if  the  suspension  contemplates  the  possible  removal 
or  dismissal  of  the  employee.  In  such  cases  a  suspension  of 
two  or  three  weeks  at  most  should  be  adequate. 

'Rule  XII,  Section  3. 


5o8  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

On  the  procedural  side  the  rule  merely  provides  that  the 
reasons  for  the  suspension  "shall,  at  the  time  of  the  suspen- 
sion, be  filed  in  the  records  of  the  proper  department  or  office 
and  copies  shall  be  furnished  to  the  Commission  upon  re- 
quest." 

Other  Factors  for  Promoting  Individual  Efficiency. — In 
shaping  policies  or  procedures  those  entrusted  with  the  ad- 
ministration of  the  personnel  system  must  ever  keep  in  mind 
the  effect  which  such  policies  and  procedures  will  have  upon 
the  morale  and  upon  the  working  efficiency  of  the  rank  and 
file  of  the  personnel,  and  in  every  case  where  a  policy  or 
procedure  has  been  discussed  in  these  pages,  such  considera- 
tions necessarily  have  been  present.  It  is  worth  while,  however, 
to  review  strictly  from  the  standpoint  of  the  employee  these 
points  in  order  to  get  in  one  place,  and  in  a  connected  way,  a 
picture  of  the  service  from  the  employee's  standpoint,  its 
attractions  and  its  drawljacks. 

General  Attractiveness  of  the  Piihlic  Service. — In  apprais- 
ing the  net  attractiveness  of  the  federal  service,  it  is  desirable 
to  recognize  at  the  outset  that,  in  almost  all  the  administrative 
and  technical  employments  of  the  government,  there  are  to  be 
found  individuals  to  whom  employment  by  the  government  is 
in  and  of  itself  more  satisfying  than  private  employment  can 
be.  This  is  due  largely  to  a  sort  of  intellectual  satisfaction 
derived  from  contact  with,  and  participation  in,  the  affairs  of 
an  organization  of  such  vast  power  and  extent  as  the  gov- 
ernment. Whatever  the  conscious  or  subconscious  psycho- 
logical elements  present,  this  preference  does  exist  and  is  to 
be  reckoned  with  as  no  insignificant  factor  in  the  recruitment 
and  maintenance  in  the  service  of  a  satisfactory  class  of  per- 
sonnel. It  is  one,  consequently,  that  should  be  fostered  in 
every  way  possible. 

One  of  the  greatest  obstacles  in  the  way  of  this  is  the  gen- 
erally low  esteem  in  which  the  government  service  is  held. 
Whatever  adjustments  may  be  made  in  the  way  of  compensa- 
tion, opportunity  for  advancement,  and  the  like,  the  federal 
service  will  still  suffer  unless  there  can  be  developed  upon  the 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  509 

part  of  the  public  as  a  whole  a  sincere  feeling  of  regard  for 
the  service.  The  development  of  a  public  regard  for  the  abil- 
ity and  idealism  of  the  intermediate  and  subordinate  admiur 
istrators  in  the  federal  service,  similar  to  the  regard  that  is 
now  generally  had  for  military  and  naval  officers,  perhaps 
would  contribute  as  much  as  any  other  single  development  to 
elevating  in  a  very  short  space  of  time  the  type  of  indi- 
vidual recruited  and  retained  in  all  grades  of  the  federal 
service. 

In  the  creation  of  the  tradition  of  prestige  for  the  service, 
the  prevailing  scale  of  compensation  perhaps  plays  a  less  im- 
portant part  than  does  the  current  estimate  of  the  efficiency 
with  which  the  work  of  the  service  is  carried  out  and  of  the 
ability  which  is  required  to  carry  it  on.  Generally  speaking, 
the  public  is  woefully  ignorant  of  the  magnitude  and  diffi- 
culties of  the  problems  of  public  administration.  In  common 
opinion,  the  operations  of  the  federal  agencies  are  simple  and 
routine  in  character,  involving  in  large  measure  but  the  wind- 
ing, unwinding,  and  rewinding  of  quantities  of  red  tape.  Of 
the  technical  difficulties,  the  organization  problems,  the  vexed 
determinations  of  policy  which  frequently  confront  even  the 
subordinate  federal  officer,  even  the  enlightened  public  is 
largely  oblivious. 

Vital  as  is  the  need  of  developing  the  reputation  of  the 
service  for  efficiency  of  management,  the  development  merely 
of  a  reputation  for  efficiency  is  not  sufficient.  In  every  field 
of  endeavor  there  are  to  be  found  men  to  whom  the  opinion 
of  the  community  is  of  less  vital  consequence  than  is  the  sat- 
isfaction of  their  own  instincts  of  workmanship.  By  such 
spirits  the  chief  reward  for  labor  and  effort  is  found  in  the 
consciousness  of  a  task  expertly  achieved,  of  time  and  material 
used  to  the  utmost,  of  waste  eliminated.  To  men  of  this  type 
the  government  service,  other  things  being  equal,  should  make 
a  strong  appeal  because  the  large  proportion  of  effort  which, 
in  every  private  industry,  is  devoted  to  the  furthering  of  purely 
competitive  ends  without  in  any  manner  contributing  to  actual 
production,  is  absent  in  governmental  operations.     Efficiency 


510  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

of  operation  is  thus  one  of  the  chief  elements  in  the  attractive- 
ness or  lack  of  attractiveness  of  the  federal  service. 

Security. — Another  prime  factor  of  attractiveness  is  that 
of  security  of  tenure  so  long  as  efficient  service  is  rendered. 
Security  of  employment  presents  two  distinct  phases — secur- 
ity against  removal  for  improper  reasons,  and  security  against 
dismissal  made  necessary  by  changes  in  conditions  rendering 
the  particular  service  no  longer  necessary.  In  both  these  re- 
spects the  federal  service  may  be  said  to  be  superior  to  private 
employment  from  the  employees'  standpoint.  The  position 
has  been  taken,  indeed,  in  a  former  chapter  that  the  protection 
which  obtains  against  improper  removal  is  not  quite  adequate. 
But  the  fact  remains  that  removal  merely  because  of  personal 
dislike  or  incompatibility,  by  no  means  uncommon  in  private 
employment,  is  hardly  known  in  the  federal  service.  Removal 
for  what  may  be  called  political  reasons  also  exists  even  in 
private  business,  especially  in  the  larger  organizations. 

On  the  score  of  security  against  business  vicissitudes  the 
federal  service  obviously  offers  one  of  its  chief  attractions  as 
against  private  employment.  In  most  branches  of  the  service 
this  security  is  virtually  complete.  It  is  not  entirely  so,  how- 
ever. It  is  inevitable  that  in  so  large  and  varied  an  organ- 
ization as  the  federal  service  certain  classes  of  work  should 
become  unnecessary  from  time  to  time,  either  being  abandoned 
altogether  or  superseded  by  improved  methods.  The  best  the 
administration  can  hope  to  do  in  cases  of  this  kind  is  to  make 
some  other  provision  for  the  employees  affected.  In  this  re- 
spect, the  federal  service,  until  recently,  was  distinctly  behind 
the  best  private  practice;  but  the  beginning  made  in  the  es- 
tablishment of  reemployment  registers  in  1919  doubtless  will 
soon  result  in  the  development  of  adequate  procedures  under 
this  head. 

The  Merit  Basis. — Still  more  fundamental  from  the  stand- 
point of  its  attractiveness  to  the  employee  is  the  recognition  of 
merit  as  the  sole  basis  for  action  in  all  matters  of  personnel 
administration.  When  the  need  and  importance  of  the  merit 
system  are  under  discussion  it  is  usually  recruitment  that  is 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  511 

particularly  in  mind.  In  point  of  fact,  however,  from  the 
standpoint  of  the  employee,  whether  actual  or  prospective,  the 
extent  to  which  the  merit  system  is  departed  from  in  initial 
recruitment  is  of  secondary  importance.  What  is  important 
to  him  is  that  once  in  the  service  he  shall  find  that  the  rewards 
of  promotion,  salary  increase,  favorable  reassignment,  and  the 
like,  and  the  punishment  of  removal,  suspension,  demotion, 
and  the  like,  shall  be  awarded  without  reference  to  personal 
or  political  considerations,  and  wholly  upon  the  basis  of  dem- 
onstrated merit.  Nor  is  it  sufficient  that  this  basis  shall  be 
adopted  merely  in  principle.  The  machinery  must  be  so  ar- 
ranged and  operated  that  all  employees  will  be  convinced  that 
it  is  applied  in  practice. 

The  review  of  existing  conditions  in  the  federal  service 
made  in  the  preceding  chapters  has  disclosed  that  neither  of 
these  conditions  generally  obtains.  The  revision  of  the  pres- 
ent procedure  for  determining  promotion,  salary  increase,  re- 
assignment, demotion,  removal,  and  the  like,  along  the  lines 
suggested  in  the  preceding  chapters,  and  with  special  emphasis 
on  those  phases  of  such  procedures  as  will  most  effectively 
bring  assurance  and  conviction  to  the  employees  is  funda- 
mental, therefore,  to  any  program  for  the  improvement  of 
the  federal  service. 

Opportunity  for  Advancement. — The  factors  which  deter- 
mine the  degree  and  kind  of  opportunity  for  advancement  in 
any  personnel  system  fall  into  two  distinct  classes.  On  the 
one  hand  are  those  factors  which  make  for  frequent  vacancies 
above  the  entrance  grade;  on  the  other,  those  factors  which 
determine  the  extent  to  which  such  vacancies,  as  they  occur, 
are  filled  by  selection  from  within  the  service,  and  the  area 
from  which  such  selection  is  usually  made. 

The  factors  affecting  the  frequency  with  which  vacancies 
occur  in  the  service  above  the  entrance  grade,  are  chiefly  three 
in  number.  Perhaps  most  important  is  the  procedure,  if  any, 
in  force  for  retiring  superannuated  personnel.  If  such  retire- 
ment is  prompt  and  universal,  the  opportunities  of  the  younger 
personnel  are  obviously  enlarged.     The  effect  which  the  ab- 


512  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

sence  of  a  retirement  system  has  in  reducing  the  opportunities 
for  advancement  of  the  younger  personnel  is  not  commonly 
appreciated.  In  discussions  of  the  problem  of  the  superan- 
nuated employee,  that  familiar  character  is  usually  thought  of 
as  occupying  a  position  of  negligible  importance;  and  the 
argument  runs  that  his  service  is  so  inconsiderable  that  it  would 
be  cheaper  to  retire  him  at  half  pay  than  to  retain  him  at  full 
pay.  In  point  of  fact,  where  there  is  no  retirement  system, 
the  superannuated  employee  is  found,  of  course,  in  positions 
of  all  degrees  of  importance,  from  lowest  to  highest,  and  is 
especially  likely  to  be  found  in  the  supervisory  positions  of 
intermediate  responsibility;  and  even  where  his  duties  have 
greatly  declined  in  importance,  he  still  is  likely  to  be  in  receipt 
of  the  salary  attached  to  his  former,  more  important,  duties. 
The  net  result  is  that  vacancies  rarely  occur  in  the  higher  or 
better  paid  places,  for  among  this  class  of  elderly  employees  of 
long  service  it  is  especially  true  that  "few  die  and  none  re- 
sign." Hence  it  is  that  a  generous  retirement  system,  per- 
mitting the  regular  v^^ithdrawal  from  the  service  of  those  who 
have  outlived  their  highest  usefulness,  greatly  increases  the 
mobility  of  the  service  and  the  opportunity  of  those  in  the 
ranks  for  advancement. 

The  enactment  of  the  retirement  act  of  1920,  though  far 
from  a  satisfactory  measure,  thus  marks  an  important  advance 
in  rendering  the  federal  service  more  attractive  not  merely 
to  the  routineer  to  whom  the  assurance  of  a  superannuation 
provision  for  his  benefit  is  of  high  importance  in  and  of  itself, 
but  to  the  young,  ambitious,  and  capable  employee  to  whom 
the  retirement  provision  itself  is  a  matter  of  indifYerence,  but 
whose  opportunities  for  advancement  during  his  working  life 
are  materially  increased  by  it. 

Perhaps  next  in  importance  to  the  retirement  system  in 
effecting  the  frequency  with  which  vacancies  occur  is  the  extent 
to  which  it  is  possible  for  employees  so  desiring  to  leave  the 
federal  service  to  enter  the  business  or  professional  world. 
The  greater  the  opportunity,  and  the  more  frequently  it  is 
availed  of,   the  greater  the  number  of  vacancies  w^ithin  the 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  513 

service.  The  present  situation  under  this  head  varies  widely 
from  service  to  service  and  from  one  occupation  or  calling  to 
another.  In  some  services,  as  for  example  in  the  Patent  Of- 
fice and  in  some  of  the  technical  services,  capable  employees 
so  desiring  find  no  difficulty  in  capitalizing  their  government 
experience  in  private  employment.  Indeed,  in  some  cases,  they 
find  this  experience  a  far  greater  asset  than  the  experience 
which  could  have  been  acquired  over  a  similar  period  in  pri- 
vate employment.  In  other  branches  of  work  quite  the  reverse 
condition  is  found.  In  still  other  branches  (and  the  bulk  of 
manual  and  mechanical  employments  doubtlessly  fall  in  this 
class)  experience  in  the  federal  service  possesses  neither  a 
greater  nor  less  market  value  than  similar  experience  in  pri- 
vate employ. 

At  the  present  time  experience  in  the  government  service  in 
a  capacity  akin  to  that  known  in  private  employment  as  "of- 
fice manager"  has  virtually  no  market  value  in  the  business 
world.  Yet  the  work  involved — the  supervision  of  a  clerical 
force  engaged  in  correspondence,  filing,  bookkeeping,  mailing, 
and  the  like — is  essentially  the  same  in  many  government  of- 
fices as  in  commercial  offices.  The  difficulty  is  that  there  has 
not  been  developed  by  those  branches  of  the  service  engaged 
in  office  work  a  reputation  for  efficiency.  In  point  of  fact 
many  government  offices  are  perhaps  more  efficiently  conducted 
than  many  commercial  offices.  But  just  as  the  office  manage- 
ment of  a  large  corporation  is  credited  with  high  efficiency  in 
the  absence  of  any  knowledge  of  the  actual  facts,  so  the  gov- 
ernment office  now  bears  the  stigma  of  inefficiency.  What  is 
chiefly  needed,  therefore,  to  give  experience  in  the  federal 
service  a  market  value  is  the  development  of  a  reputation  for 
efficiency. 

This  is  not  to  say  that  it  is  to  be  accepted  as  the  policy  of 
the  federal  service  that  it  should  be  in  any  degree  less  attrac- 
tive to  the  capable  employee  than  the  conditions  obtaining  in 
private  employment.  On  the  contrary,  it  goes  without  say- 
ing that  every  effort  should  be  made  by  the  federal  personnel 
administration  to  establish  such  conditions  that  the  capable 


514  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

employee  will  ordinarily  find  it  entirely  satisfactory  to  remain 
in  the  service.  But  no  matter  how  high  a  standard  may  be 
reached  in  the  development  of  the  federal  service,  or  of  any 
service,  there  must  always  be  a  not  inconsiderable  proportion 
of  cases  in  which  a  particular  individual  finds  the  prospect  be- 
fore him  in  the  service  much  less  to  his  liking  than  he  does  the 
prospect  of  transferring  to  some  other  organization.  It  is 
for  this  percentage  of  cases  that  the  service  should  make  pro- 
vision, along  the  lines  herein  suggested. 

There  are  some,  indeed,  who  would  have  the  service  take 
the  opposite  view.  The  resignation  from  the  federal  service 
of  a  capable  employee  to  enter  private  employment  is  regarded 
by  them  as  a  loss  to  the  service  which  should  be  prevented  in 
every  way  possible.  Such  a  view,  however,  fails  to  take  into 
account  the  larger  benefits  which  flow  from  the  increased  at- 
tractiveness of  the  service  precisely  by  reason  of  the  oppor- 
tunity which  exists  for  shifting  to  private  employment  and  by 
reason  also  of  the  increased  opportunity  for  advancement 
within  the  service  which  thus  results.  There  is,  of  course,  a 
point  beyond  which  the  departure  of  men  to  private  service 
would  indicate  an  unhealthy  condition,  and  that  that  point  has 
long  been  reached  in  certain  of  the  federal  services  has  already 
been  pointed  out.  But  up  to  that  point  the  flow  of  men  to 
private  service,  and  so  far  as  consistent  with  the  other  re- 
quirements of  sound  personnel  administration,  the  counter- 
flow  of  men  from  private  employment  to  the  federal  service, 
may  be  regarded  as  a  hopeful  sign  of  fluidity  and  vigor. ^ 

The  final  factor  which  determines  the  frequency  with  which 

^  While  in  the  above  discussion  the  increase  in  the  market  value  of 
experience  in  the  federal  service  has  been  regarded  as  merely  one  ele- 
ment affecting  the  frequency  with  which  vacancies  occur  in  the  service, 
thus  promoting  the  opportunity  for  advancement  in  the  service,  it  need 
hardly  be  said  that  an  increase  in  the  value  of  the  employee's  services  in 
the  employment  market  is  in  and  of  itself  something  which  makes  the 
service  attractive  to  the  employee.  Indeed  in  some  branches  of  the  serv- 
ice, of  which  the  Patent  Office  is  the  most  conspicuous  example,  the 
high  rate  at  which  experience  in  the  service  can  be  capitalized  in  priv_ate 
employment  is  perhaps  the  chief  and  for  many  the  solo  attraction  of  the 
service.  Needless  to  say,  however,  where  such  a  condition  results  it  is 
hardly  a  desirable  one  from  the  standpoint  of  tlic  service,  however  at- 
tractive it  may  be  from  the  standpoint  of  the  employee  who  is  thus  able 
to  capitalize  his  experience  in  the  service. 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  515 

vacancies  occur  in  a  service  usually  is  the  rate  of  expansion 
in  the  service  itself.  This  is  not,  however,  like  the  other  fac- 
tors mentioned,  a  matter  of  policy  to  be  determined  in  ad- 
vance. While  exceptions,  of  course,  occur  now  and  then,  the 
general  statement  is  warranted  that  so  far  as  affected  by  this 
factor  the  opportunity  for  advancement  in  the  federal  service 
is  considerably  more  limited  than  in  private  employment. 
Only  in  rare  and  exceptional  cases  do  branches  of  the  federal 
service  expand  with  anything  like  the  rapidity  that  charac- 
terizes vigorous  business  enterprises.  The  factor  of  internal 
expansion  is  indeed  the  one  on  which  industrial  concerns, 
for  the  most  part,  rely  chiefly  to  create  the  vacancies  neces- 
sary for  providing  sufficient  opportunity  for  advancement  for 
the  subordinate  personnel.  The  creation  of  new  services, 
however,  does  occur  from  time  to  time  and  presents  an  unusual 
opportunity  to  award  advancement  to  faithful  employees  who 
have  not  found  such  opportunity  within  the  branches  of  the 
organization  where  they  may  be  employed.  It  might  be 
thought,  therefore,  that  when  opportunities  of  this  kind  oc- 
curred they  would  be  exploited  to  the  utmost.  It  is  notorious, 
however,  that  partly  owing  to  the  failure  to  make  any  positive 
provision  either  by  Congress,  the  President,  or  the  Civil  Serv- 
ice Commission,  and  partly  owing  to  the  prohibitory  provi- 
sions enacted  by  Congress  and  confirmed  by  the  rules  of  the 
Civil  Service  Commission,  the  opportunity  presented  by  the 
creation  of  new  services  seldom  has  been  availed  of  to  any- 
thing like  the  full  extent.  In  view  of  the  relative  unimpor- 
tance of  the  factor  of  internal  expansion  in  the  federal  serv- 
ice, it  is  all  the  more  important  that  thorough-going  measures 
be  taken,  by  way  of  the  retirement  system  and  of  enhancing 
the  marketability  of  experience  in  the  federal  service  in  the 
private  employment  market,  to  increase  as  much  as  possible 
the  rate  of  frequency  of  occurrence  of  vacancies  and  to  fill  the 
vacancies  that  do  occur  as  far  as  possible  from  within  the 
service. 

The  desirability  of  restricting  selection  for  such  vacancies 
as  occur  above  the  entrance  grade  to  those  already  in  the  serv- 


5i6  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

ice  as  far  as  practicable,  and  indeed  of  providing,  even  at  some 
expense  and  trouble,  means  whereby  those  already  in  the  serv- 
ice who  would  not  otherwise  be  eligible  for  certain  lines  of 
promotion  may  qualify  themselves  for  such  promotion,  has 
been  fully  considered  already.  The  placing  of  all  the  political 
administrative  posts  upon  a  merit  basis,  the  elimination  under 
all  ordinary  conditions  of  recruitment  from  without  for  any 
position  which  can  with  substantially  equally  satisfactory  re- 
sults be  filled  from  within,  and  the  provision,  within  reason- 
able limits,  of  means  whereby  those  within  the  service  may 
equip  themselves  for  advanced  responsibility,  comprise  the 
measures  which  should  be  taken  in  the  federal  service  to  in- 
crease the  opportunity  of  those  within  the  service  to  attain 
promotion  to  such  vacancies  as  occur. 

But  for  maximum  attractiveness  of  the  service  it  is  not  suf- 
ficient merely  that  such  vacancies  as  occur  within  a  service  are 
filled  from  within :  it  is  equally  essential  that  they  be  filled  by 
the  selection  of  the  most  capable  employee  wherever  avail- 
able; and  this  means,  both  that  the  method  of  selection  must 
be  correct,  and  that  the  area  of  selection  shall  be  sufficiently 
extensive.  In  a  preceding  chapter  the  considerations  which 
should  govern  in  determining  the  proper  area  from  which  se- 
lection for  any  given  vacancy  is  to  be  made  were  considered, 
and  need  not  be  reviewed  here.  What  is  essential  to  note  here 
is  that  it  is  in  this  particular  respect — that  of  failing  adequately 
to  extend  the  area  of  selection  from  within,  leaving  some  of 
the  ablest  employees  who  have  had  the  misfortune  to  become 
located  in  certain  branches  of  the  service  with  far  fewer  op- 
portunities for  promotion  than  their  less  able  fellows  in  other 
branches — that  the  federal  service  has  fallen  furthest  short  of 
realizing  its  full  possibilities  in  the  field  of  enlarging  the  op- 
portunity for  advancement.^ 

*  One  specific  point  at  which  the  area  of  selection  from  \yithin  is 
now  commonly  improperly  defined  in  the  federal  service,  resulting  in  a 
severe  curtailment  of  the  opportunity  for  advancement  of  the  more 
capable  employees,  deserves  special  mention.  As  has  been  pointed  put 
already,  in  not  a  few  of  the  field  services,  each  local  establishment  is 
an  independent  unit,  at  least  so  far  as  the  more  important  officers  is  con- 
cerned,   a   transfer   from   one    station    to   another   occurring   only   in    the 


THE  MAINTENANCE  OF  EFFICIENCY  517 

Summarizing  then  the  steps  which  should  be  taken  to  en- 
large the  opportunities  for  advancement  offered  by  the  fed- 
eral service  generally,  they  are : 

1.  The  establishment  of  a  retirement  system  insuring  the 
prompt  retirement  of  superannuated  employees. 

2.  The  development,  for  the  service  generally  and  particu- 
larly for  those  branches  in  which  work  is  analogous  to  that 
of  private  employment,  of  a  reputation  for  efficiency  which 
would  facilitate  the  passage  of  personnel  to  such  employment. 

3.  The  provision  of  facilities  for  instruction  of  the  subor- 
dinate personnel  in  subjects  tending  to  qualify  them  for  ad- 
vancement to  specific  positions  not  in  the  natural  line  of  pro- 
motion. 

4.  The  placing  of  all  administrative  posts,  that  is,  all  posts 
except  that  of  head  of  department,  upon  a  merit  basis. 

5.  The  express  recognition  of  the  principle  that  positions 
are  to  be  filled  by  promotion  rather  than  by  selection  from 
outside,  except  where  compelling  reasons  exist  to  the  contrary. 

6.  The  encouragement,  instead  of  the  obstruction,  of  free 
transfer,  within  clearly  defined  technical  group  lines,  from 
service  to  service  and  from  department  to  department. 

7.  Particularly,  the  staffing  of  new  services  so  far  as  pos- 
sible by  the  transfer  of  personnel  from  the  old  services. 

8.  The  definite  organization  of  all  field  services,  and  par- 
ticularly the  postal  and  customs  services,  on  a  national  basis, 
so  as  to  facilitate  the  transfer  of  the  higher  officers  of  those 
services  from  station  to  station. 

rarest  instances.  The  obvious  result  is  that  a  capable  employee  in  one 
of  the  smaller  of  these  establishments  has  far  fewer  opportunities  for 
advancement  than  a  less  capable  employee  in  one  of  the  larger  establish- 
ments. There  is  everything  to  be  gained  and  nothing  to  be  lost  by  the 
organization  of  all  these  services  upon  a  national  basis  which  will  trans- 
fer the  higher  officers  of  the  service  from  station  to  station. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

WORKING   CONDITIONS 

The  substantive  policies  which  are  pursued  with  respect 
to  matters  affecting  individual  employees — compensation,  re- 
cruitment, promotion,  reassignment,  removal,  retirement,  and 
the  like — and  the  fairness  and  effectiveness  with  which  those 
policies  are  applied,  constitute  the  major  elements  of  the  work- 
ing environment.  In  addition  to  these,  there  are,  however, 
certain  general  factors  having  to  do  with  the  conditions  under 
which  employees  give  their  services  that  are  of  no  little  in- 
fluence in  determining  the  morale  and  thus  the  efficiency  of  a 
personnel  system. 

Hours  of  Labor. — The  conditions  with  respect  to  the 
hours  of  labor  in  the  departments  at  Washington  are  stated 
thus  by  the  Reclassification  Commission :  ^ 

Requirements  as  to  hours  of  work  in  the  Washington  serv- 
ice are  more  uniform  than  most  other  conditions  of  employ- 
ment, and  do  not  differ  materially  from  those  generally  in 
effect  elsewhere.  Seven  hours  constitute  a  normal  day's  work 
for  the  clerical  and  professional  group  of  employees,  and  eight 
hours  for  the  manual,  making  aggregates  of  42  and  48  hours 
per  week.  From  June  15  to  Sef)tember  15,  four  hours  con- 
stitute a  day's  work  on  Saturday,  thus  reducing  the  aggregate 
to  39  and  44  hours  per  week  during  that  period.  Hours  for 
office  workers  generally  in  effect  outside  of  the  government 
service  are  7  or  'jYz  hours  for  5  days  and  4  or  43/2  on  Sat- 
urdays in  the  office  building  districts  of  the  larger  cities  such 
as  Boston,  New  York,  and  Chicago.  In  mercantile  establish- 
ments and  factories,  hours  for  office  workers  are  more  usually 
yYi  or  8  per  day,  often  with  no  Saturday  half-holiday.  The 
eight-hour  day  is  now  normal  for  manual  workers  outside  as 
well  as  inside  of  the  government  service. 

^  Report  of  Reclassification  Commission,  Part  I,  p.  89. 

518 


WORKING  CONDITIONS  519 

Substantially  the  same  conditions  exist  throughout  the  field 
service. 

During  the  war  the  attempt  was  made  to  increase  the  hours 
of  all  government  employees  to  eight,  and  a  bill  carrying  a 
provision  for  this  purpose  was  actually  passed  by  Congress, 
despite  the  opposition  of  the  employees,  strongly  enforced  by 
organized  labor.  The  bill  was  vetoed  by  the  President  on  the 
ground  that  the  department  heads  already  had  the  power  to 
require  eight  hours'  service,  an  objection  hardly  relevant  inas- 
much as  the  object  of  the  law  was  to  prevent  the  depart- 
ment heads  from  requiring  or  permitting  less  than  eight  hours' 
service.^ 

Overtime  Work. — Overtime  work,  on  the  whole,  is  un- 
common in  the  federal  service.  In  the  departments  at  Wash- 
ington, unusual  congestion  of  business,  or  the  necessity  for 
completing  a  report  or  other  document  by  a  certain  date,  occa- 
sionally results  in  overtime  work.  In  the  field  establishments 
similar  occasions  arise,  and  in  some  services,  as  in  the  customs 
inspection  service,  in  the  inspection  of  passenger  baggage,  the 
nature  of  the  work  sometimes  calls  for  large  amounts  of  over- 
time. In  the  postal  service  also,  there  is  necessarily  a  pro- 
portion of  overtime  work.  In  the  Government  Printing  Of- 
fice, the  Bureau  of  Engraving  and  Printing,  and  other  indus- 
trial establishments  of  the  government,  overtime  work  is  not 
uncommon. 

It  is  elementary  that  overtime  work  should  be  kept  within 
the  narrowest  limits  possible — that  a  sufficient  force  should 
be  provided,  and  the  work  so  organized  and  directed,  that  no 
overtime  work  will  be  necessary  normally.  The  regulations 
governing  overtime  work  should  be  so  framed  as  to  deter  the 
management  from  relying  upon  overtime  work  except  under 
the  most  urgent  circumstances.  The  most  effective  way  to 
accomplish  this  is  to  require  the  payment  of  employees  for 
overtime  work,  and  payment  moreover  at  an  increased  rate. 

*  There  was  already  on  the  statute  books  a  law  (Act  of  March  15, 
1898,  30  Stat.  316)  requiring  the  heads  of  departments  to  exact  "not 
less  than  seven  hours  of  labor  each  day,  except  Sundays  and  days  de- 
clared public  holidays  by  law  or  executive  order." 


520  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

A  general  provision  of  law  ^  now  prohibits  such  payment 
unless  expressly  authorized  by  law ;  and  such  authorization 
has  been  made  only  in  the  case  of  per  hour  and  per  diem  em- 
ployees and  piece-rate  workers  in  the  Bureau  of  Engraving 
and  Printing  and  the  Government  Printing  Office,  where  50  per 
cent  and  20  per  cent  additional  compensation,  respectively,  are 
allowed  for  overtime,  and,  in  the  case  of  postal  employees, 
where  overtime  work  is  compensated  for  in  proportion  to  the 
salaries  as  fixed  by  law. 

It  is  hardly  open  to  question  that  the  principle  of  payment 
for  overtime  at  an  increased  rate  should  be  adopted  uniformly 
in  all  the  branches  of  the  service  in  which  payment  is  by  the 
piece,  the  hour,  or  the  day.  Nor  is  there  any  reason  why  it 
should  not  be  applied  even  to  employments  compensated  on 
an  annual  basis,  where  the  work  is  of  a  routine,  standardized 
character  resulting  in  a  definitely  measurable  product.  As  ex- 
amples of  such  employments  might  be  cited  the  operation  of 
card-perforating  machines,  addressographs,  multigraphs,  and 
the  like,  or  the  filing  of  cards  or  documents  of  a  standard  char- 
acter in  files  of  large  size. 

When,  however,  the  attempt  is  made  to  apply  the  principle 
of  payment  for  overtime,  whether  at  regular  or  extra  rates,  to 
ordinary  clerical  and  administrative  work  of  the  government, 
as  is  proposed  by  the  Federation  of  Federal  Employees,  the 
question  assumes  another  aspect.  The  work  performed  in 
these  employments  is  not  capable  of  measurement  in  standard 
units  so  that  the  daily  output  can  be  accurately  checked.  Here, 
if  payment  is  made  for  overtime,  especially  if  payment  is  made 
at  rates  considerably  in  excess  of  the  normal  rate  (and  the 
proposal  of  the  Federation  is  for  rates  running  from  one-half 
to  twice  the  normal  rates),  there  is  created  a  strong  temptation 
on  the  part  of  the  employee  to  make  overtime  work  for  him- 

*  Sec.  1764  of  the  Revised  Statutes  reading:  "No  allowance  or  com- 
pensation shall  be  made  for  any  extra  services  whatever  which  any  officer 
or  clerk  may  be  required  to  perform,  unless  expressly  authorized  by 
law."  There  is,  moreover,  a  specific  provision  relatinj^  to  the  Washing- 
ton service,  providing  "that  if  the  heads  of  departments  shall  extend  the 
hours  of  labor  beyond  the  7-hour  minimum  required  by  law,  such  ex- 
tension sliall  be  without  additional  compensation."  (Act  of  March  15, 
1898,  30  Stat.,  316.) 


WORKING  CONDITIONS  521 

self  by  slackening  his  efforts  during  normal  working  hours. 
It  will  be  said,  of  course,  and  with  truth,  that  a  capable  execu- 
tive will  be  able  to  repress  any  tendency  of  this  kind;  but  it 
would  be  a  mistake  to  frame  personnel  policies  always  with  a 
view  to  their  execution  by  executives  of  the  highest  capacity. 
The  experience  of  other  personnel  systems,  as  actually  admin- 
istered, indicates  that  for  the  ordinary  clerical  and  semi-ad- 
ministrative employments  payment  for  overtime  has  the  ten- 
dency described. 

There  is  another  aspect,  moreover,  in  which  the  clerical 
and  administrative  services  stand  on  a  different  basis  than  do 
those  employments  which  are  compensated  on  a  piece,  or 
hourly,  or  daily  basis.  In  these  employments,  employment  is 
not  secure  but  varies  according  to  the  amount  of  work  on  hand, 
and  a  diminution  in  the  amount  of  work  promptly  results  in 
the  discharge  of  the  proportionate  number  of  employees. 
Hence  it  is  in  the  nature  of  the  employment  that  compensation 
should  be  proportionate  to  the  output,  and  that  overtime  should 
be  fully  paid  for.  In  the  clerical  and  administrative  services 
on  the  other  hand  a  temporary  lull  in  the  activity  of  the  or- 
ganization, which  not  infrequently  occurs  and  which  makes 
wholly  possible  a  temporary  reduction  of  the  force  without 
any  impairment  of  the  efficiency  of  the  organization,  is  not  in 
fact  taken  advantage  of  in  this  way.  The  employees  are  re- 
tained in  service  and  though  their  attendance  for  the  full  work- 
ing time  is  required,  the  work  proceeds  at  a  reduced  pressure. 
Instances  of  this  kind  are  familiar  throughout  the  adminis- 
trative branches  of  the  federal  service.  It  seems  no  more 
than  just,  therefore,  that  in  these  branches  of  the  service  oc- 
casional overtime  work  should  not  be  the  occasion  for  any  in- 
crease in  compensation. 

Leave  Privileges. — Closely  related  to  the  question  of 
working  hours  is  that  of  leave  of  absence  with  pay.  No  uni- 
form rules  regarding  leave  are  universally  applicable  through- 
out the  federal  service.  The  most  widely  applicable  legisla- 
tion on  the  subject  provides 


522  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

That  the  head  of  any  department  may  grant  thirty  days' 
annual  leave  with  pay  in  any  one  year  to  each  clerk  or  em- 
ployee: And  prozndcd  further,  That  where  some  member  of 
the  immediate  family  of  a  clerk  or  employee  is  afllicted  with 
a  contagious  disease  and  requires  the  care  and  attendance  of 
such  employee,  or  where  his  or  her  presence  in  the  department 
would  jeopardize  the  health  of  fellow  clerks,  and  in  exceptional 
and  meritorious  cases,  where  a  clerk  or  employee  is  personally 
ill,  and  where  to  limit  the  annual  leave  to  thirty  days  in  any 
one  calendar  year  would  work  peculiar  hardship,  it  may  be 
extended  in  the  discretion  of  the  head  of  the  department,  with 
pay,  not  exceeding  thirty  days  in  any  one  case  or  in  any  one 
calendar  year. 

This  section  shall  not  be  construed  to  mean  that  so  long 
as  a  clerk  or  employee  is  borne  upon  the  rolls  of  the  depart- 
ment in  excess  of  the  time  herein  provided  for  or  granted  that 
he  or  she  shall  be  entitled  to  pay  during  the  period  of  such 
excessive  absence,  but  that  the  pay  shall  stop  upon  the  ex- 
piration of  the  granted  leave.  (30  Stat.  316,  March  15, 
1898.) 

In  interpreting  this  provision  the  Comptroller  of  the  Treas- 
ury has  ruled 

The  act  of  March  15,  1898  (30  Stat.  316),  and  the  acts 
amendatory  thereof  governing  the  subject  of  leaves  of  absence 
in  the  executive  departments,  do  not  entitle  employees  to  leaves 
of  absence  as  a  matter  of  right,  but  simply  authorize  the  heads 
of  departments,  in  their  discretion,  to  grant  leaves  of  absence 
with  pay  within  the  limits  therein  fixed.  In  the  exercise  of 
their  discretion  the  heads  of  departments  may  make  the  grant- 
ing of  leaves  of  absence  dependent  upon  good  conduct  or  faith- 
ful service,  or,  under  proper  conditions,  may  refuse  to  grant 
any  leaves,  and,  of  course,  they  make  the  matter  of  granting 
leaves  the  subject  of  general  regulations.  Such  regulations, 
when  duly  promulgated,  and  not  in  conflict  with  the  law  on 
the  subject,  are  binding  on  all  employees  concerned,  who  are 
chargeable  with  the  knowledge  of  the  existence  of  such  regu- 
lations. (XXII  Decision  of  Comptroller  of  Treasury,  103; 
decision  of  August  2t^,  19 15.) 

Each  department  has  its  own  practice  with  respect  to 
granting  leave  under  the  authority  of  the  statute.  In  several 
departments,  the  full  amount  of  leave  permitted  by  the  law 


WORKING  CONDITIONS  523 

is  granted  under  reasonable  formalities;  whereas  in  others  the 
regulations  curtail  the  amount  of  sick  leave  by  providing  an 
allowance  of  10  days  a  year  which  is  cumulative,  with  the  pro- 
vision that  not  more  than  30  days  may  be  taken  in  any  one 
year.  For  establishments  not  under  executive  departments, 
special  legislation  has  been  adopted  in  some  instances.  For 
the  postal  service,  exclusive  of  the  Department  proper,  the 
provisions  are  far  less  generous.  Prior  to  the  recent  reclas- 
sification of  the  postal  service  only  fifteen  days'  leave  wnth 
pay  were  granted  to  clerks  and  employees  in  first  and  second 
class  post  offices  and  employees  of  mail  bag  repair  shops  ( 1890, 
October  i,  26  Stat.  648).  The  new  provision  (1920,  June  5, 
41  Stat.  1052),  which  provides  for  cumulative  sick  leave,  reads 
as  follows : 

Employees  in  the  Postal  Service  shall  be  granted  fifteen 
days'  leave  of  absence  with  pay,  exclusive  of  Sundays  and  holi- 
days, each  fiscal  year,  and  sick  leave  wath  pay  at  the  rate  of 
ten  days  a  year  to  be  cumulative  for  a  period  of  three  years, 
but  no  sick  leave  with  pay  in  excess  of  thirty  days  shall  be 
granted  during  any  three  consecutive  years.  Sick  leave  shall 
be  granted  only  upon  satisfactory  evidence  of  illness  and  if  for 
more  than  two  days  the  application  therefor  shall  be  accom- 
panied by  a  physician's  certificate. 

The  fifteen  days'  leave  shall  be  credited  at  the  rate  of  one 
and  one-quarter  days  for  each  month  of  actual  service. 

The  provision  for  30  days'  annual  leave,  common  to  the 
departments  proper,  is  generally  regarded  as  reasonably  sat- 
isfactory. To  this  allowance  of  30  days  are  charged  all  ab- 
sences with  pay  except  those  due  to  personal  illness,  to  con- 
tagious diseases  in  the  family  or  to  military  duty  in  the  Na- 
tional Guard  on  parade  or  encampment  days.  Thus  if  an 
employee  is  tardy  or  desires  to  be  excused  for  a  brief  period, 
the  absence  is  charged  against  his  annual  leave.  Statistics 
show  that  the  great  majority  of  employees  take  each  year 
practically  the  entire  amount  of  annual  leave  to  which  they 
are  entitled;  and,  as  a  rule,  they  are  granted  the  leave  when 
they  apply  for  it.     In  certain  instances,  however,  employees 


524  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

may  be  entirely  deprived  of  their  leave  because  of  pressure  of 
work,  or  they  may  be  denied  permission  to  take  it  when  they 
want  it.  Sometimes  this  restriction  applies  only  to  a  particu- 
lar person  and  sometimes  to  an  entire  organization  unit  at  a 
particular  time.  As  a  result  of  the  restrictions,  the  employees' 
organizations  have  advocated  legislation  that  would  make  an- 
nual leave  a  matter  of  right  and  not  a  matter  of  privilege. 
The  recommendations  of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  in 
this  matter,  as  contained  in  the  l>ill  submitted  by  it  were 
that: 

Each  employee  shall  be  entitled  to  a  leave  of  absence  with 
full  compensation  of  two  and  one-half  days,  exclusive  of 
Sundays  and  holidays  for  each  month  during  his  employ- 
ment. .  .  .  The  head  of  the  department  shall  determine  when 
such  leave  may  be  granted  to  an  emi)loyec  under  his  control 
or  direction,  but  any  employee  who  has  not  been  granted  the 
leave  to  which  he  is  entitled  ...  at  the  time  requested  may 
appeal  to  the  [employment]  commission,  which  shall  deter- 
mine whether  such  employee  shall  be  granted  such  leave  and 
the  time  when  such  leave  shall  be  granted  and  such  determina- 
tion shall  be  final. 

The  bill  drafted  by  the  Reclassification  Commission  also 
provided  that  in  case  of  the  death  of  an  employee  his  estate 
should  be  paid  an  amount  equal  to  the  compensation  to  which 
he  would  be  entitled  by  virtue  of  any  accumulated  leave,  not 
to  exceed  30  days.  These  provisions  go  as  far  as  it  seems 
wise  in  the  direction  of  recognizing  that  the  employee  has  a 
right  to  his  accumulated  leave. 

The  Reclassification  Commission's  recommendations  in  re- 
gard to  sick  leave  recognize  the  principle  of  cumulative  leave. 
It  would  have  such  leave  accumulate  at  the  rate  of  ten  days  a 
year,  with  a  proviso  that  not  to  exceed  sixty  days  could  be 
granted  in  any  one  calendar  year.  Statistics  gathered  by  the 
Commission  from  representative  branches  of  the  service  for 
the  five-year  period  from  1914  to  1918  showed  that  the  aver- 
age number  of  days'  sick  leave  was  5.4  and  that  on  the  average 
48.9  per  cent  of  the  employees  took  no  sick  leave;  32.9  per 


WORKING  CONDITIONS  525 

cent  took  10  days  or  less,  and  only  3.5  per  cent  were  granted 
the  full  30  days.^ 

The  recognition  of  the  principle  of  cumulative  sick  leave 
would  represent  a  distinct  step  in  advance  over  the  present 
system  of  30  days'  leave  without  any  provision  for  accumula- 
tion, but  it  is  somewhat  difficult  to  see  a  good  reason  for  limit- 
ing the  amount  of  sick  leave  which  an  employee  may  be  granted 
in  any  one  year,  provided  he  has  earned  it.  Many  private 
employers  have  recognized  an  obligation  to  care  for  their  em- 
ployees when  they  are  ill.  They  accomplish  this  by  carrying 
them  on  the  active  roll  during  temporary  illness  and  by  retir- 
ing them  on  disability  annuities  if  they  are  permanently  dis- 
abled. Some  foreign  governments  have  similar  arrangements, 
and  the  United  States  government  has  now  established  a  re- 
tirement system  which  provides  a  disability  annuity  for  any 
one  who  may  be  disabled  after  15  years  of  service. 

The  proper  solution  of  the  problem  of  sick  leave  lies  in  the 
direction  of  very  generous  provisions  for  bona  fide  cases  of 
prolonged  illness,  with  rigid  supervision  and  investigation  to 
prevent  fraud.  All  the  statistics  of  sick  leave  among  federal 
employees  that  have  been  compiled  show  that  the  overwhelm- 
ing majority  of  the  employees  do  not  abuse  the  privilege  of 
sick  leave;  and  if  the  government  should  adopt  a  very  liberal 
policy,  such  as  is  now  pursued  by  some  large  private  compa- 
nies, it  would  not  involve  a  very  heavy  expenditure.  The 
cost,  doubtless,  would  be  more  than  offset  by  the  fact  that  a 
liberal  provision  in  the  event  of  sickness  would  be  a  very  at- 
tractive feature  to  government  employees  whose  salaries  are 
such  that  they  must  manage  their  affairs  on  a  modest,  well  or- 
dered basis  and  cannot  easily  provide  for  prolonged  illness. 
Physical  Environment,  Medical  Services,  etc. — There  is 
available  no  comprehensive  survey  of  the  conditions  prevailing 
under  this  head  in  the  post  offices,  customs  houses,  and  other 
field  establishments  of  the  government  in  which  physical  con- 
ditions are  likely  to  be  below  the  standard.  In  the  absence  of 
such  a  survey  it  is  impossible  to  state  what  the  conditions  are. 

*  Report  of  the  Reclassification   Commission,   Part   I,  p.  93. 


526  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

As  regards  conditions  at  Washington,  the  Reclassification  Com- 
mission reported :  ^ 

Taken  as  a  whole,  government  buildings  in  Washington 
are,  it  is  true,  generally  clean  and  well  kept,  and  toilet  and 
washing  facilities  are  sufficient.  As  regards  such  important 
features  as  ample  working  space,  proper  illumination,  ventila- 
tion, and  humidity,  however,  there  is  neither  adequate  pro- 
vision nor  any  accepted  standard.  Many  illustrations  have 
been  brought  to  the  attention  of  the  Commission  of  working 
conditions  which  should  be  remedied  and  which  must  neces- 
sarily have  a  detrimental  influence  on  the  health  and  efficiency 
of  the  employees. 

In  the  field  of  medical  inspection  and  the  provision  of  med- 
ical and  recreational  facilities,  practically  nothing  is  done  by 
the  federal  government  for  the  employees.  Here  the  practice 
of  the  government  falls  far  behind  that  of  many  progressive 
corporations.  The  need  for  work  in  this  line  is  emphasized 
by  the  Reclassification  Commission  in  its  report  as  follows : 

As  an  integral  part  of  any  comprehensive  employment  pol- 
icy, and  more  specifically  as  a  means  of  increasing  efficiency, 
the  government  should  adopt  a  program  making  adequate  pro- 
vision for  the  health  and  for  proper  physical  working  condi- 
tions for  its  employees  which  will  enable  it  at  least  to  keep 
pace  with  the  more  progressive  concerns  in  the  industrial 
world.  To  be  of  the  greatest  value,  all  work  along  these  lines 
should  obviously  be  coordinated  and  concentrated  in  a  single 
agency  having  at  its  disposal  competent  medical  officers.  The 
Public  Health  Service,  which  is  already  handling  some  work 
of  this  sort  in  the  Treasury  Department,  is  in  an  excellent  po- 
sition to  function  as  such  an  agency.  It  is,  therefore,  recom- 
mended that  the  Public  Health  Service  be  charged  with  general 
supervision  over  all  matters  affecting  the  health  of  government 
employees  in  so  far  as  these  are  connected  with  their  official 
work.  To  exercise  such  supervision  to  advantage  it  should  be 
specifically  authorized  and  directed : 

I.  To  establish  rest  and  relief  rooms  under  the  supervision 
of  resident  nurses  and  physicians.  Such  relief  rooms  should 
be  equipped  with  first  aid  appliances,  simple  medicinal  reme- 

^  Ibid.,  p.  10 1. 


WORKING  CONDITIONS  5^7 

dies,  and,  if  possible,  a  few  beds.  They  should  aim  to  prevent 
minor  ailments  from  having  serious  results;  save  the  time 
which  would  otherwise  be  required'  for  the  employee  to  con- 
sult a  physician  or  go  home;  and  improve  the  morale  of  the 
force. 

2.  To  establish  a  visiting-nurse  system  with  the  following 
responsibilities : 

(a)  To  check  up  sick  leave  and  unexplained  absences. 

(b)  To  see  that  sick  employees  are  receiving  proper 

care  and  attention,  but  not  to  administer  bed- 
side care  or  treatment. 

(c)  To   ascertain   the  occurrence  of   communicable 

diseases  and  to  prevent  their  spread  through 
the  medium  of  other  employees  living  with 
those  who  had  become  sick. 

3.  To  conduct  systematic  periodical  investigations  of  work- 
ing conditions  in  government  offices,  so  far  as  these  affect 
the  health  of  the  employee,  including  inspection  of  such  mat- 
ters as  ventilation,  illumination,  toilet  facilities,  cleanliness, 
etc.,  with  authority  to  enforce  the  carrying  out  of  its  recom- 
mendations as  to  needed  changes. 

Investigations  of  this  sort  might  often  be  made  to  advan- 
tage in  cooperation  with  the  Bureau  of  Standards,  which  is  in 
a  position  to  be  of  assistance  in  such  matters. 

4.  To  conduct  a  systematic  campaign  of  health  educa- 
tion; to  check  up  the  health  of  individual  employees  with  a 
view  to  improving  general  health  conditions  and  to  detecting 
such  troubles  as  incipient  tuberculosis,  typhoid  carriers,  and 
defective  mentality;  and  should  encourage  employees  to  pre- 
sent themselves  periodically  for  medical  examination.^ 

With  respect  to  the  element  of  safety  in  the  government 
buildings  and  structures,  the  Reclassification  Commission  re- 
ported that: 

Present  conditions  could  be  materially  improved  by  the 
adoption  of  a  safety  program,  which  should  at  least  meet  the 
standard  set  by  the  more  progressive  States,  municipalities, 
and  private  employers.  The  very  fact  that  buildings  owned, 
leased,  or  controlled  by  the  federal  government  are  subject  to 
no  other  jurisdiction,  makes  it  incumbent  on  the  government  to 
take  the  initiative  in  seeing  to  it  that  conditions  are  such  as  not 

*  Report  of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  Part  I,  pp.  102  ff. 


528  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

to  endanger  either  the  health  or  the  safety  of  its  employees. 
The  few  instances  of  preventable  accidents  already  cited  are 
sufficient  to  indicate  that  a  reasonable  safety  program  would 
save  the  government  far  more  than  it  would  cost.  It  is  poor 
economy  for  any  employer  to  expose  his  employees  to  unneces- 
sary danger,  to  say  nothing  of  the  human  considerations  in- 
volved. 

Such  a  program  should  be  developed  along  three  main  lines 
— safe  construction,  safety  inspection,  and  safety  education. 
Some  central  authority,  such  as  the  U.  S.  Employees'  Compen- 
sation Commission,  should  assume  the  leadership  in  the  work. 
It  should  be  empowered  to  employ  a  competent  safety  engineer 
who  would  correlate  and  exercise  general  supervision  over  the 
safety  activities  of  the  government,  and  who  would  cooperate 
with  the  various  government  establishments  in  the  prevention 
of  personal  injuries  among  their  employees.  The  Bureau  of 
Standards,  which  is  active  in  the  development  of  safety  codes 
and  in  the  conduct  of  investigations  leading  to  safe  construc- 
tion, should  be  officially  associated  with  the  U.  S.  Employees' 
Compensation  Commission  in  the  work.^ 

^  Ibid.,  pp.  104  flf. 


CHAPTER  XV 

ORGANIZATION  FOR  PERSONNEL  ADMINISTRATION 

The  organization  which  should  be  provided  for  carrying 
into  effect  the  necessary  procedures  has  necessarily  received 
incidental  attention  in  connection  with  the  discussion  of  the 
several  phases  of  personnel  administration.  The  purpose  of 
the  present  chapter  is  to  bring  together  these  several  sugges- 
tions and  discussions  and,  by  integrating  them,  to  consider  in 
a  unified  way  the  organization  which  is  and  should  be  provided 
for  the  several  branches  oi  personnel  administration  in  the 
federal  service. 

Analysis  of  the  Problem. — The  question  of  the  organiza- 
tion for  personnel  administration  in  the  federal  service  may 
be  considered  conveniently  under  three  heads :  first,  the  dis- 
tribution of  the  several  functions  of  personnel  administration 
between  the  central  personnel  authority  and  the  departmental 
or  bureau  authorities;  second,  the  organization  of  the  central 
personnel  authority;  and  third,  the  organization  of  the  de- 
partmental or  bureau  authorities. 

For  the  purpose  of  considering  the  problem  of  organiza- 
tion for  personnel  administration,  the  functions  of  personnel 
administration  may  be  considered  or  classified  conveniently 
under  the  following  heads :  first,  the  formulation  of  standard 
schedules  of  classes  and  grades  of  work  and  of  compensation 
rates ;  second,  the  appraisal  of  specific  positions ;  third,  re- 
cruitment; fourth,  the  regulation  of  processes  affecting  par- 
ticular individuals  in  the  personnel,  such  as  promotion,  salary 
increase,  reassignment,  transfer,  demotion,  dismissal,  and  the 
like;  fifth,  the  promotion  of  measures  bearing  on  no  particu- 
lar employee  specifically,  but  calculated  to  improve  the  health, 

529 


530  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

safety,  and  morale  of  the  personnel  generally;  and  sixth,  the 
suppression  of  political  activity  among  the  personnel. 
Organization  for  Recruitment. — In  the  field  of  recruit- 
ment, the  question  of  the  distribution  of  authority  between 
central  and  departmental  agencies  is  a  simple  one.  The  ad- 
vantages of  a  central  recruiting  agency  over  any  system  of 
departmental  recruiting  agencies  is  hardly  open  to  question. 
A  central  examining  machinery,  which  can  be  used  for  the 
service  of  all  departments  is  manifestly  more  economical  than 
would  be  a  system  of  separate  departmental  agencies.  Due 
to  the  wider  field  over  which  it  operates,  and  its  larger  size, 
such  an  agency  is  capable  of  greater  specialization  along  par- 
ticular lines  of  employment.  More  important  still,  it  is  only 
through  such  an  agency  that  complete  assurance  of  impartial- 
ity in  ratings  can  be  had.  The  further  removed  the  rating 
body  is  from  the  influence  of  the  department  or  service  for 
which  recruitment  is  being  carried  on,  the  greater  the  assur- 
ance that  personal  preferences  will  not  unduly  influence  action. 
There  is,  however,  always  a  danger  in  a  highly  centralized 
recruiting  system  that  the  particular  needs,  and  more  espe- 
cially the  peculiar  needs,  of  certain  branches  of  the  service  may 
not  be  accurately  met.  This  may  be  due  merely  to  a  lack  of 
intimate  knowledge  on  the  part  of  the  central  agency  of  those 
peculiar  requirements.  There  is,  however,  also  the  possibility 
that  the  central  recruiting  agency,  being  in  no  wise  subordi- 
nate to  or  under  the  control  of  the  several  departments  and 
services,  may  tend  to  give  too  slight  a  weight  to  the  objections 
and  criticisms  of  its  work  originating  in  those  departments. 
The  central  agency  is  more  than  likely  to  feel  that  such  criti- 
cisms arise  from  an  imperfect  knowledge  of  the  examining 
technique  of  which  it  feels  itself  the  master.  These  disad- 
vantages of  a  central  recruiting  agency  have  been  experienced, 
in  a  measure  at  least,  in  the  federal  service.  In  part  they  have 
been  due  to  the  inadequate  force  which  has  been  at  the  dis- 
posal of  the  Civil  Service  Commission;  but  the  more  intangible 
factor  mentioned  doubtless  has  also  had  its  influence.  The 
attempt  should  therefore  be  made  to  secure,  in  a  more  formal 


ORGANIZATION  FOR  ADMINISTRATION        531 

way,  the  assistance  of  the  several  departments  in  the  work  of 
the  central  recruiting  agency.  A  departmental  organization 
for  this  purpose  need  consist  merely  of  a  committee  of  admin- 
istrative officers  of  various  grades,  acting  through  sub-com- 
mittees organized  on  the  basis  of  the  several  classes  of  service 
involved.  Such  a  departmental  committee  could  give  inten- 
sive study  to  the  plans  of  all  proposed  examinations  affecting 
the  department  before  the  formal  adoption  of  plans  by  the 
Civil  Service  Commission,  as  well  as  criticism  to  questions  or 
tests  and  rating  methods  actually  employed.  Out  of  such  de- 
partmental committees  might  grow  inter-departmental  com- 
mittees, one  of  each  major  class  of  employment,  which  might 
perform  similar  functions.  Whatever  the  precise  development 
however,  it  is  believed  that  in  this  direction  lie  important  pos- 
sibilities for  improving  the  recruitment  practice  of  the  Civil 
Service  Commission. 

The  process  of  recruitment  does  not,  however,  end  with 
the  promulgation  of  eligible  lists.  The  determination  of  the 
particular  list  to  be  selected  for  certification  to  fill  a  particular 
vacancy,  the  selection  of  the  eligible  to  be  appointed  from 
those  certified,  and  the  careful  observation  of  the  new  ap- 
pointee during  the  probationary  period — these  are  all  matters 
in  which  the  department  has  of  necessity  a  greater  or  less  de- 
gree of  participation  and  for  which  a  definite  organization 
should  be  provided  in  the  department.  The  extent  to  which 
such  an  organization  is  provided  at  the  present  time,  as  op- 
posed to  the  practice  of  trusting  the  particular  administrative 
officer  concerned  with  complete  freedom  in  these  respects  varies 
from  department  to  department.  In  hardly  any  department, 
however,  does  the  appointment  clerk  figure  anything  like  as 
prominently  and  effectively  in  these  phases  of  the  recruitment 
process  as  a  capable  personnel  manager  should  and  would. 

The  Problem  of  the  Examimng  Personnel. — From  what 
has  been  said  regarding  the  several  types  of  tests,  and  their 
respective  limitations  and  values,  it  need  not  be  argued  at 
length  that  the  correct  planning  of  the  enormous  variety  of 
examinations  necessary  to  meet  the  recruiting  requirements 


532  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

of  the  federal  service,  and  the  framhig  of  the  actual  tests,  calls 
for  a  high  type  of  ability;  and  that  certainly  so  far  as  these 
examinations  are  applied  to  the  higher  and  more  important 
types  of  positions,  the  comparative  rating  of  the  candidates 
also  calls  for  a  high  order  of  capacity.  The  development 
of  an  examining  staff  equal  to  these  exacting  requirements 
would  thus  seem  to  be  the  first  essential  of  the  federal  re- 
cruitment system. 

In  general  tv^o  methods  may  be  employed  in  the  develop- 
ment of  an  examining  staff.  Either  an  independent  stafif  en- 
gaged exclusively  in  examining  work  may  be  created  by  the 
central  agency,  or  the  personnel  of  operating  departments  may 
be  used  as  the  occasion  arises.  From  every  standpoint  the 
creation  of  an  independent  staff  is  the  preferable  method. 
Only  if  the  recruiting  staff  is  wholly  independent  of  the  ap- 
pointing department  will  the  examination  system  command  the 
respect  and  confidence  of  the  general  public  and,  more  particu- 
larly, of  prospective  competitors  and  applicants.  This  is  not 
to  say  that  it  may  not  be  possible  to  develop  a  system  in  which 
the  personnel  of  the  appointing  department  employed  in  ex- 
amining work  is  entirely  free,  in  fact,  from  the  influence  of 
the  department,  or  from  other  improper  influence.  The  point 
is  simply  that,  whatever  the  actual  facts,  such  a  system  cannot 
enlist  the  confidence  of  the  public  to  the  same  extent  as  does  a 
system  in  which  the  examining  force  is  entirely  independent  of 
the  appointing  department,  and  stands,  therefore,  in  the  posi- 
tion of  an  arbiter  between  the  department  and  the  applicant 
for  appointment. 

From  the  standpoint  of  technical  efficiency  also  the  pro- 
fessional examining  staff,  when  properly  recruited  and  de- 
veloped, gives  results  far  superior  to  those  obtained  by  the 
use  of  the  personnel  of  the  operating  department.  It  is  not 
commonly  appreciated  to  how  great  an  extent  the  planning  of 
examinations,  the  formulation  of  tests,  and  even  in  a  measure 
the  rating  of  the  experience  and  performance  of  the  several 
candidates  constitutes  a  distinct  technique  or  a  distinct  art. 
The  fact  will  nevertheless  be  vouched  for  by  all  who  have  had 


ORGANIZATION  FOR  ADMINISTRATION        533 

experience  in  these  matters,  that  an  examiner  who  has  both 
skill  and  experience  will  almost  invariably  produce  better  re- 
sults in  the  planning  of  an  examination,  the  formulation  of 
tests,  and  often  even  in  the  rating  of  candidates  than  a  spe- 
cialist in  the  particular  field  concerned  who  is  without  ex- 
tensive examining  experience. 

It  is  consequently  possible  to  build  up,  in  the  course  of 
time,  a  central  examining  staff  of  limited  numbers  that  is 
capable  of  conducting,  on  its  own  responsibility  and  with  ex- 
cellent results,  examinations  covering  a  surprisingly  large  and 
varied  field.  From  time  to  time  there  arise,  however,  exam- 
inations calling  for  knowledge  of  some  specialty  which  is  be- 
yond the  range  of  the  permanent  examining  staff,  so  that  it 
becomes  necessary  to  employ  temporary  assistants.  Here  too, 
on  the  general  principle  of  disassociating  the  appointing  de- 
partment from  the  examination  as  completely  as  possible,  it 
is  desirable  that  there  should  be  employed  not  members  of 
the  personnel  of  the  appointing  department  but  specialists  from 
the  business,  the  professional,  or  the  academic  world  who  have 
no  connection  with  the  service. 

Summarizing,  it  is  vital  to  the  success  of  the  recruitment 
system  that  there  be  independent  examining  staffs  adequate 
in  number  and  in  ability  to  conduct  on  their  own  responsibility 
the  entire  examination  process  for  most  of  the  positions  in 
the  service,  and  that  there  be  available  sufficient  funds  to  make 
possible  the  employment  of  competent  specialists  outside  the 
service  for  such  examinations  as  are  beyond  the  range  of  the 
permanent  staff. 

Neither  of  these  requirements  has  been  adequately  recog- 
nized by  Congress  up  to  the  present  time  in  making  provision 
for  the  staff  of  examiners  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission. 
The  number  of  examiners  has  been  kept  much  below  what  was 
needed  properly  to  handle  the  great  volume  of  work  imposed 
upon  it,  thus  preventing  on  the  one  hand  as  high  a  develop- 
ment of  examining  technique  for  the  higher  posts  as  is  de- 
sirable, merely  through  lack  of  time  on  the  part  of  the  exam- 
iners, and,  on  the  other,  the  development  of  a  sufficient  range 


534  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

on  the  part  of  the  permanent  staff;  so  that  reliance  has  had  to 
be  placed  to  a  greater  extent  than  it  should  be  upon  outside 
assistance.  Even  in  examinations  that  are  well  within  the 
capacity  of  the  Commission's  examiners  there  has  thus  been 
necessitated,  particularly  for  positions  in  the  field  services,  an 
undue  reliance  upon  outside  assistance. 

Even  more  inimical  to  the  development  of  an  examining 
staff  equal  to  the  requirements  of  the  classified  service  have 
been  the  compensation  rates  fixed  for  examiners.  These  rates, 
as  fixed  by  Congress  or  as  contemplated  in  its  appropriation 
for  the  examining  staff  of  the  Commission,  have  been  little 
above  the  rate  fixed  for  the  most  ordinary  kind  of  clerical 
duty.  The  salary  of  the  chief  examiner  has  for  years  been 
and  still  is  $3,600 — less  than  that  fixed  for  the  chief  clerks 
in  some  of  the  departments;  and  the  salaries  of  his  subordi- 
nates have  been  fixed  at  proportionate  figures.  In  view  of  the 
utter  inadequacy  of  these  rates  it  is  indeed  amazing  that  the 
Commission  should  have  been  able  to  recruit  and  retain  as 
efficient  an  examining  staff  as  it  has.  The  explanation  is 
doubtless  to  be  found  in  large  part  in  the  peculiar  attractive- 
ness which  the  position  of  examiner  in  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission has  to  a  certain  type  of  mind  because  of  its  central 
position  in  the  government. 

The  inadequacy  of  the  permanent  staff  provided  for  the 
Commission  by  Congress  has  not  been  made  up  by  adequate 
provision  for  the  employment  of  outside  experts.  It  is  only 
since  191 1  that  appropriations  for  this  purpose  have  been 
granted  at  all,  and  from  the  first  they  have  been  and  continue 
to  be  wholly  inadequate  in  amount.  As  a  result  the  Com- 
mission has  been  compelled  to  rely  to  no  small  extent  upon 
the  services  of  the  personnel  of  the  several  departments.  This 
practice  has  been  recognized  by  the  Commission  itself  as  ob- 
jectionable for  the  reasons  already  set  forth. 

Referring  to  the  methods  now  used  by  the  Commission  in 
connection  with  the  use  of  the  personnel  of  the  departments 
for  examining  work,  the  Chief  Examiner  of  the  Commission, 
in  1915,  said: 


ORGANIZATION  FOR  ADMINISTRATION        535 

Some  years  ago,  owing  to  a  very  inadequate  force,  the 
commission  was  obliged  to  rely  almost  wholly  upon  experts 
in  the  employ  of  the  government  and  often  even  to  depend 
entirely  upon  those  employed  in  the  bureau  for  which  an  ex- 
amination was  held.  Although,  as  already  stated,  such  help 
is  still  obtained  to  a  considerable  extent,  the  commission  is  al- 
ways represented  in  the  rating  of  papers  by  an  examiner  trained 
in  the  essentially  judicial  function  of  weighing  evidence  of 
qualifications.  In  this  way  the  commission  is  able  to  assume 
full  responsibility  for  all  of  the  examining  work.  Moreover, 
experience  shows  that  an  examination  that  will  accurately  meas- 
ure relative  ability  for  almost  any  kind  of  work  can  best  be 
framed  by  one,  or  under  the  supervision  of  one,  who  has  had 
thorough  training  in  the  preparation  of  competitive  examina- 
tions. This  is  often  demonstrated  by  the  fact  that  questions 
submitted  to  the  commission  by  scientific  experts  in  various 
lines  need  revision,  for  the  reason  that  those  who  prepare  the 
questions  have  not  had  experience  in  the  preparation  of  such 
tests  and  the  rating  of  examination  papers.^ 

It  is  believed  that  the  Commission  should  make  every  ef- 
fort to  eliminate  entirely  the  practice  of  employing  depart- 
mental experts  for  examining  work.  The  Commission  is  in- 
deed open  to  the  criticism  of  having  failed  to  present  the  case 
for  larger  appropriation  for  this  purpose  with  sufficient  vigor 
to  Congress.  The  same  may  be  said,  with  justice,  of  the 
recommendations  which  the  Commission  has  made  from  time 
to  time  for  the  increase  of  the  salary  of  the  chief  examiner 
and  his  subordinate.  It  is  believed  that  if  these  recommenda- 
tions had  been  pushed  more  vigorously  by  the  Commission, 
and  if  the  support  of  the  National  Civil  Service  Reform 
League  and  similar  organizations  had  been  enlisted,  it  would 
then  have  been  possible  to  have  made  greater  progress  in  this 
direction. 

In  the  four  systems  of  formal  selections  which  have  been 
set  up  in  the  unclassified  service — that  for  presidential  post- 
master, for  the  consular  and  diplomatic  service,  for  the  Pub- 
lic Health  Service  and  for  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey — 

*  Thirty-second  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commis- 
sion (191S),  P-  21. 


536  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

the  personnel  of  the  department  in  each  case  participates  in 
the  examination  process.  The  Public  Health  Service  controls 
the  examination  exclusively;  the  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey 
also  controls  the  examination  for  presidential  appointment, 
but  its  choice  is  limited  to  persons  who  have  already  been 
certified  by  the  Civil  Service  Commission. 

It  is  believed  that  the  general  position  here  taken  in  favor 
of  the  conduct  of  the  examination  process  by  a  personnel  en- 
tirely independent  of  the  department  has  application  to  all 
three  systems. 

Organization  for  Internal  Administration. — The  extent  to 
which  what  may  be  termed  the  internal  processes  of  personnel 
administration — promotion,  transfer  and  reassignment,  sal- 
ary increases,  demotions,  dismissals,  lay-ofifs,  etc. — should  be 
controlled  centrally  has  been  very  fully  discussed  in  the  chap- 
ters dealing  with  those  phases,  and  need  not  be  reviewed  here. 
In  general  it  may  be  said,  however,  that  the  principle  of  or- 
ganization to  be  observed  in  this  field  is  that  of  decentraliza- 
tion, the  central  agency  being  employed  or  invoked  only  when 
the  departmental  machinery  is  thought  inadequate  or  unre- 
liable. That  the  departmental  authorities  should  always  act 
in  accordance  with  regulations  promulgated  by  the  central 
authority,  and  under  strict  central  supervision.  Nor  should 
this  supervision  be  confined  to  the  review  of  documents. 
Effective  supervision  can  be  exercised  only  by  the  use  of  rep- 
resentatives of  a  cali1>er  sufficiently  high  to  command  respect 
from  the  departments,  who  shall  be  free  to  participate  in  the 
discussions  of  the  departmental  authorities.  Suggestions 
already  made  in  the  several  chapters  regarding  the  participa- 
tion of  such  representatives  of  the  central  agency,  in  the 
processes  of  promotion,  service  rating,  and  removal  are  illus- 
trative of  the  type  of  supervision  which  should  thus  be  exer- 
cised. 

Organization  for  Classification  of  Positions  and  Salaries. 
— The  formulation  of  standard  schedules  of  classes  and  grades 
of  service,  and  of  the  compensation  rates  attached  thereto, 
is  manifestly  a   function   for  which   the   final   responsibility 


ORGANIZATION  FOR  ADMINISTRATION        537 

should  rest  in  a  central,  rather  than  in  a  departmental,  agency. 
The  central  agency  can  and  should  obtain  invaluable  assist- 
tance,  however,  from  an  advisory  body  drawn  from  the  depart- 
ments. This  advisory  body  should  be  organized  primarily  by 
classes  of  employment,  each  of  the  departments  in  which  a 
given  class  of  employment  i§  found  being  represented  on  the 
committee  for  that  class.  For  special  classes  or  sub-classes 
of  employment  found  only  in  one  department  or  service,  the 
membership  of  the  committee  would  be  correspondingly  drawn 
from  a  single  department  or  service.  Since  the  schedule  of 
classes  and  grades  of  service  and  of  compensation  rates  for 
such  a  class  of  service  primarily  concern  only  the  one  depart- 
ment, the  central  agency  may  give  to  the  recommendations  of 
the  departmental  committee  for  this  class  of  service  a  weight 
more  nearly  controlling  than  is  given  to  the  recommendations 
of  the  departmental  committee  generally.  Nevertheless  the 
final  responsibility  for  the  establishment  of  the  classes,  grades, 
and  salary  rates  concerned  must  rest  with  the  central  agency 
and  should  not  be  divided. 

The  appraisal  of  specific  positions  to  determine  their  allo- 
cation in  the  standard  schedule  is  even  more  clearly  an  indi- 
visible central  function.  Even  here,  however,  departmental 
committees  could  exercise  a  function  of  information  and  criti- 
cism that  should  do  much  toward  reducing  the  possibilities  of 
injustice  and  of  inequitable  appraisal. 

Organization  for  Determination  of  Physical  Work  Con- 
ditions.— The  promotion  of  measures  designed  to  promote 
the  health,  safety,  welfare,  or  morale  of  the  personnel  is  a 
function  that  naturally  organizes  itself  along  departmental,  as 
well  as  central,  lines.  The  central  organization  is  needed  for 
planning  and  coordination  in  this  field,  but  the  actual  detailed 
execution  should  be  left  preferably  to  the  several  departments, 
which  should  maintain  organizations  of  their  own  for  this 
specific  purpose. 

Organization  for  Elimination  of  Political  Considerations. 
— The  suppression  of  political  assessments,  political  coercion, 
and  improper  political  activity,  being  directed  chiefly  against 


538  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

the  i)rincipal  administrative  officers  themselves,  must  mani- 
festly be  a  central  function. 

Dual  Character  of  the  Problem  of  Central  Personnel 
Administration. — Analysis  of  the  problem  of  central  ad- 
ministration as  set  forth  above  shows  that  the  functions  per- 
taining to  a  central  administrative  agency  fall  into  two  dis- 
tinct categories :  those  having  for  their  purpose  to  assist  the 
several  operating  services  in  meeting  their  personal  needs  and 
those  having  for  their  purpose  to  supervise  and  control  such 
services  in  the  practical  work  of  handling  their  personnel.  As 
a  recruiting  agency  the  central  service  is  nothing  more  than  a 
supply  service,  one  having  for  its  duty  to  supply  the  personnel 
needed  by  the  several  o])erating  services.  As  a  supervisory 
and  controlling  agency  its  function  is  to  see  that  the  operating 
services  organize  and  operate  proper  systems  for  insuring 
efficiency  on  the  part  of  their  personnel,  determining  on  a  merit 
basis  assignments,  increases  of  salaries,  promotions,  transfers, 
and  the  like,  and  that  those  in  authority  are  not  actuated  by 
improper  motives  in  handling  these  matters. 

It  is  elementary  that  two  distinct  functions,  particu- 
larly when  the  ends  in  view  are  of  a  diverse  character,  should 
never  be  combined  in  the  same  organization  unless  a  positive 
case  for  so  doing  can  be  made  out.  It  is  evident  in  the  pres- 
ent case  that  the  attempt  by  the  same  organization  to  perform 
both  of  the  functions  that  have  been  mentioned  presents  seri- 
ous difficulties  in  respect  to  the  effectiveness  with  which  each 
may  be  performed.  Where  the  promotive  or  assisting  func- 
tion, as  represented  by  the  recruitment  of  personnel,  is  car- 
ried on  by  the  same  agency  that  also  carries  on  the  regulatory 
work,  it  is  difficult  for  the  departments  to  assume  toward  that 
agency  a  wholly  cooperative  attitude.  That  this  result  actually 
has  ensued  in  the  case  of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  is 
hardly  open  to  doubt.  Generally  speaking,  the  departments 
are  inclined  to  regard  the  latter  as  a  restrictive  rather  than 
a  cooperative  or  service  agency.  The  divorce  of  the  recruiting 
function  from  the  regulatory  function  would  thus  make  it  far 


ORGANIZATION  FOR  ADMINISTRATION        539 

easier  for  the  central  recruiting  agency  to  develop  a  truly  co- 
operative attitude  toward  itself  on  the  part  of  the  departments. 

In  view  of  the  foregoing  the  question  is  presented  whether 
the  present  system  of  vesting  both  assisting  and  controlling 
functions  in  respect  to  personnel  matters  in  a  single  agency, 
the  Civil  Service  Commission,  is  not  fundamentally  wrong, 
and  whether  better  results  could  not  be  secured  by  making  pro- 
vision for  two  agencies,  one  to  concern  itself  wholly  with  re- 
cruitment and  the  other  with  matters  of  general  supervision 
and  control. 

Even  from  the  standpoint  of  the  work  itself,  regardless  of 
departmental  relations,  the  independent  organization  of  the 
recruiting  work  has  a  high  value.  From  the  standpoint  of 
volume  of  work  and  of  the  force  required,  the  recruiting  w^ork 
of  the  central  agency  is  almost  invariably  far  greater  than  the 
regulatory  work.  This  has  been  particularly  so  in  the  case 
of  the  Civil  Service  Commission  because  its  regulatory  func- 
tions have  been  left  comparatively  undeveloped,  while  on  the 
recruiting  side  it  has  occupied  almost  the  whole  of  its  pos- 
sible field.  But  even  with  a  much  fuller  development  of  its 
regulatory  functions,  they  would  still  be  considerably  less  im- 
portant from  the  standpoint  of  volume  alone  than  the  recruit- 
ing function.  The  natural  result  of  this  situation  is  that  the 
attention  which  must  be  given  to  the  recruiting  work  by  those 
in  charge  of  the  central  agency  militates  against  the  fullest 
development  of  the  regulatory  functions  and  against  their  most 
efficient  administration.  An  agency  devoted  exclusively  to 
regulatory  work  and  relieved  from  all  responsibility  of  re- 
cruiting work  would  be  able  far  more  effectively  and  ade- 
quately to  exercise  the  powers  of  regulation  entrusted  to  it. 

One  special  aspect  of  this  matter  is  perhaps  worthy  of 
mention.  In  the  exercise  of  its  regulatory  powers  in  connec- 
tion with  matters  of  promotion,  transfer,  and  the  like,  the 
regulatory  body  necessarily  sits  in  judgment,  as  it  were,  upon 
the  efficiency  of  the  recruiting  process.  Manifestly  this  re- 
sponsibility better  becomes  the  regulatory  body  when  that  body 
is  not  itself  responsible  for  the  recruiting  system.     Moreover, 


540  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

the  regulatory  body  is  then  in  a  position  to  give  to  the  recruit- 
ing system,  at  least  at  those  points  which  are  involved  in  this 
connection,  an  impartial  criticism  not  now  available,  which 
should  be  most  salutary  and  beneficial  for  the  recruitment 
system. 

If  the  recruitment  system  be  thus  independently  organ- 
ized, there  would  seem  to  be  no  need  of  placing  it  in  the  hands 
of  a  board.  The  function  of  recruitment  is  a  purely  technical 
one.  A  single  commissioner,  who  would  discharge  substan- 
tially the  same  functions  that  are  now  discharged  by  the  Chief 
Examiner  of  the  Civil  Senice  Commission,  but  with  far  higher 
standing  and  prestige,  on  general  principles,  would  be  more 
effective  than  a  board. 

The  work  of  the  regulatory  authority,  on  the  other  hand, 
is  judicial.  It  affects  in  an  important  way  the  rights  and 
fortunes  of  individual  employees  and  prescribes  the  regula- 
tions by  which  its  own  and  departmental  action  in  matters 
coming  under  its  jurisdiction  shall  be  guided.  It  necessarily 
exercises,  moreover,  powers  of  a  legislative  character.  It  is 
on  all  accounts  proper,  therefore,  that  a  board  of  at  least  three 
be  provided  for  the  purpose.  In  view  of  the  importance  of 
the  decisions  to  be  made,  it  would  possibly  be  better  to  have 
a  larger  board  than  three.  A  board  of  nine  has  been  sug- 
gested by  the  advisory  committee  appointed  by  the  Reclassi- 
fication Commission. 

It  is  also  suggested  by  that  committee  that  the  board  be 
composed  of  an  equal  number  of  representatives  of  the  em- 
ployees, of  the  administrative  officers  of  the  government,  and 
of  appointees  of  the  President,  the  precise  manner  of  selection 
of  the  employee  and  the  management  representatives  not  being 
specified.  If  a  practical  method  of  selection  could  be  worked 
out,  there  would  be  much  to  recommend  this  proposal.  It 
would  enable  the  management  and  the  employees  to  get  their 
views  before  the  regulatory  authority,  not  from  the  outside, 
as  is  now  the  case,  but  within  the  regulatory  body  itself;  while 
at  the  same  time  the  members  appointed  directly  by  the  Presi- 
dent would  hold  the  balance  of  power  in  any  issue  on  which 


ORGANIZATION  FOR  ADMINISTRATION        541 

the  management  and  the  subordinate  employees  might  be  at 
variance,  through  a  divergence  of  interest,  fancied  or  real. 

Regardless,  however,  of  the  size  of  the  central  regulatory 
body,  new  principles  should  be  observed  in  its  composition. 
It  should  be  wholly  non-partisan,  and  it  should  have  a  more 
permanent  tenure  than  is  now  possessed  by  the  Civil  Service 
Commission.  The  present  requirement  of  the  civil  service 
law  that  not  more  than  two  of  the  three  members  of  the  Civil 
Service  Commission  shall  be  members  of  the  same  political 
party  has  not  prevented  that  body  from  time  to  time  from 
having  something  of  a  political  character,  though  it  must  be 
said  that  some  presidents,  notably  Roosevelt,  have  permitted 
the  majority  of  the  Commission  to  be  of  the  opposite  poHtical 
faith  over  a  considerable  portion  of  their  administrations.  A 
truly  non-partisan  character  in  the  Commission  can  be  as- 
sured, however,  only  by  establishing  a  position  of  permanence 
in  office  more  firmly  than  it  is  believed  to  exist  at  the  present 
time.  This  can  be  done  effectively,  it  is  believed,  only  by  the 
application  of  the  system  now  found  in  the  organization  of 
the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission ;  that  of  appointment  for 
fixed  terms,  such  terms  to  be  overlapping,  and  with  the  removal 
power,  though  legally  still  unimpaired  in  the  hands  of  the 
President,  hedged  about  with  the  moral  restriction  of  a  statu- 
tory declaration  that  it  shall  be  exercised  only  for  reasons 
necessary  for  the  good  of  the  service  and  to  be  communicated 
to  Congress  or  to  the  Senate. 

Finally,  it  would  be  well  to  provide  in  the  act  that  the  per- 
sons selected  as  Civil  Service  Commissioners  shall  be  persons 
experienced  in  public  administration.  It  is  believed  that  were 
all  these  provisions  to  be  put  into  effect  there  would  be  de- 
veloped, in  a  relatively  short  time,  a  tradition  of  permanence 
and  non-political  character  for  the  Civil  Service  Commission 
that  would  result  in  a  distinct  improvement,  not  merely  in  the 
personnel  of  that  body,  but  in  the  regard  in  which  the  whole 
system  of  civil  service  administration  stands  in  the  public 
estimation. 

Desirable  as  are  these  changes  in  the  organization  of  the 


542  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

central  regulatory  body,  their  effectiveness  must  continue  to 
be  limited  until  an  adequate  salary  is  provided  for  the  mem- 
bers of  the  board.  The  present  salary  of  the  Civil  Service 
Commissioners,  $4,000  per  annum,  is  pitifully  inadequate. 
Members  of  the  personnel  regulatory  board,  whatever  their 
numbers,  should  receive  at  least  a  compensation  as  great  as 
and  probably  greater  than  that  received  by  the  chiefs  of  any 
of  the  bureaus  or  independent  establishments  of  the  govern- 
ment. 

The  question  of  whether  the  recruiting  and  regulating 
functions  should  be  united  or  separated  is  the  major  question 
in  the  organization  of  the  central  personnel  administration. 
This  decided,  the  organization  of  the  other  functions  of  per- 
sonnel administration  may  be  determined  on  more  readily. 

The  formulation  of  a  standard  schedule  of  classes  and 
grades  of  service,  and  of  compensation  rates,  is  one  which 
principally  concerns  the  regulatory  body,  since  it  is  that  body 
which  is  to  promulgate  the  regulations  for  and  administer 
regulations  for  increases  of  salary,  promotion  from  grade  to 
grade,  transfer  from  class  to  class,  and  the  other  varied  ques- 
tions involved  in  the  administration  of  a  large  personnel  sys- 
tem, which  should  in  every  case  involve  a  consideration  of 
the  standard  schedule  of  classes  and  grades.  So  far,  however, 
as  the  positions  and  grades  in  the  schedule  are  original  en- 
trance positions,  the  formulation  of  the  schedule  is  of  in- 
terest also  to  the  recruiting  agency,  and  provision  should  be 
made  for  its  cooperation  with  the  regulatory  agency.  The 
function  of  appraising  positions  and  allocating  them  to  stand- 
ard schedules  is  one  which  primarily  concerns  the  regulatory 
agency.  The  recruitment  agency  is  hardly  concerned  at  all. 
The  promotion  of  the  health,  safety,  and  morale  of  the  per- 
sonnel is  a  function  which  does  not  bear  any  close  relation  to 
either  the  function  of  recruitment  or  regulation,  nor  is  it  ap- 
parent that  there  is  any  advantage  in  associating  it  with  the 
organization  scheme  of  either  of  those  functions.  The  Pub- 
lic Health  Service  suggests  itself  as  an  agency  that  might  have 
this  matter  in  charge. 


ORGANIZATION  FOR  ADMINISTRATTOK        543 

The  last  of  the  major  classes  of  functions  to  be  performed 
by  the  central  personnel  administration — that  of  suppressing 
and  detecting  political  coercion  and  improper  political  activity 
in  the  service — is  similarly  a  function  pertaining  to  the  regu- 
lative rather  than  the  recruiting  agency. 
Departmental  Organization. — It  would  involve  too  great 
a  departure  from  the  purpose  of  the  present  work  to  enter  into 
any  detailed  consideration  of  the  technical  problems  involved 
in  setting  up  and  operating  the  machinery  required  in  each 
department  or  service  for  the  proper  handling  of  personnel 
matters.  It  is  proper,  however,  to  point  out  that  scarcely  a 
beginning  has  been  made  by  the  several  departments  and  ser- 
vices of  the  federal  government  towards  the  provision  of  the 
machinery  that  is  required  for  the  proper  handling  of  this 
branch  of  administration.  The  existing  offices  of  appointment 
clerks  are  for  the  most  part  but  offices  of  record  or  for  the 
formal  performance  of  certain  duties.  What  h  required  is 
that  these  offices  shall  be  expanded  so  as  to  give  to  them 
responsibility  in  respect  to  practically  all  personnel  matters. 
The  appointment  clerk  should  have  a  status  and  character 
comparable  to  that  of  the  employment  manager  of  big  private 
corporations.  It  should  be  his  responsibility  to  see  that  proper 
systems  for  assigning,  rating,  and  determining  the  efficiency 
of  employees  are  devised  and  properly  operated.  The  ex- 
istence of  such  a  departmental  personnel  manager,  further- 
more, would  facilitate  greatly  the  central  personnel  agencies 
in  the  proper  performance  of  their  duties. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  AND  COMMITTEES 

The  question  of  the  place  of  organizations  of  employees 
in  a  system  of  public  personnel  administration  presents  itself 
in  two  forms:  (i)  The  desirability  of  employees  effecting 
organizations  along  trade  union  lines  and  in  case  of  the  forma- 
tion of  such  unions,  the  relations  that  such  unions  should  have 
to  unions  composed  of  persons  other  than  government  em- 
ployees; and  (2)  the  desirability  of  the  constitution  by  gov- 
ernment employees  of  committees  having  for  their  purpose  to 
represent  them  in  respect  to  making  known  their  desires  as  re- 
gards their  employment  conditions.  The  first  aspect  of  this 
question  will  be  considered  under  the  head  of  "Employees' 
Organizations,"  the  latter  under  that  of  "Employees'  Com- 
mittees." 

Employees'  Organizations. — Until  recent  years  the  prob- 
lem of  eliminating  politics  from  the  federal  personnel  system 
has  been  confined  to  preventing  the  politicians  from  using  the 
personnel  system  for  political  ends.  Within  recent  years,  how- 
ever, the  problem  has  emerged  of  preventing  the  organized 
employees  from  using  their  political  power  to  compel  the  po- 
litical government  to  take  action  in  personnel  matters  that 
is  not  warranted  or  demanded  by  administrative  considera- 
tions alone. 

Although  this  problem  is  of  comparatively  recent  develop- 
ment in  the  United  States,  it  is  not  novel.  Sooner  or  later  it 
is  encountered  in  every  large  public  personnel  system  in  which 
the  employees  have  political  rights  and  are  permitted  to  or- 
ganize for  the  collective  use  of  their  political  power.  Al- 
though old  and  universal,  the  problem  presents  itself  with 
varying   force  and  emphasis  in  different  systems  because  of 

544 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  545 

the  varying  distribution  of   the   political   and   administrative 
power  in  the  several  governmental  organizations. 

In  Great  Britain  the  existence  of  "dock-yard  constituen- 
cies"— that  is,  "navy-yard  constituencies" — has  long  been  rec- 
ognized.^ The  control  of  such  constituency  over  members  of 
Parliament,  however,  is  much  weaker  than  in  a  similar  case 
in  the  United  States  for  the  reason  that  the  English  member 
is  not  irrevocably  bound  to  any  one  constituency,  since  if  de- 
feated in  one  he  may  seek  election  from  another  district. 

In  Victoria  the  political  power  of  the  organized  workers 
on  the  state  railways  became  so  pronounced  and  threatened  so 
continuous  an  increase  that  the  constitution  of  the  province 
was  amended  so  as  to  deprive  all  civil  servants,  including  the 
railway  employees,  of  their  rights  of  general  suffrage,  sub- 
stituting therefor  the  right  to  elect  a  fixed  number  of  mem- 
beifs  who  would  be  officially  recognized  as  representing  the  in- 
terests of  the  Civil  Service. 

Existing  Employees'  Organization. — A  large  proportion 
of  the  federal  employees  are  members  of  employees'  organ- 
izations, in  the  nature  of  trade  unions.  In  the  postal  service 
unionization  is  fairly  complete,  there  being  large  national  or- 
ganizations of  postal  clerks,  of  letter  carriers,  and  of  railway 
mail  employees,  not  to  mention  an  organization  of  presidential 
postmasters.  In  the  service  outside  the  postal  department  is 
found  the  National  Federation  of  Federal  Employees,  com- 
posed of  a  number  of  local  "Federal  Employees'  Unions"  lo- 
cated at  a  number  of  different  points  throughout  the  country. 

The  peculiar  feature  of  the  Federal  Employees'  Unions 
embraced  in  the  National  Federation  of  Federal  Employees  is 
that  their  membership  is  confined  to  no  single  occupational 
group  and  no  single  branch  of  the  service  but  is  open  to  any 
and  every  federal  employee,  other  than  postal  employees,  of 
whatever  occupation  and  in  whatever  branch  of  the  service  em- 
ployed. In  the  smaller  places  all  the  federal  employees  in  the 
locality  are  members  of  a  single,  undifferentiated  local  fed- 
eral employees'  union,  and  in  the  larger  places,  as  at  Wash- 

^  See  Lowell,  The  Government  of  England,  vol.  I,  p.  149. 


546  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

ington,  are  found  two  or  more  distinct  local  federal  employ- 
ees' unions,  each  one  embracing  a  different  part  of  the  service. 

In  addition  to  these  organizations,  which  are  distinctively 
for  federal  employees,  a  very  large  proportion  of  the  federal 
service  is  composed  of  men  engaged  in  mechanical  trades  who 
are  members  of  the  regular  craft  unions  of  their  respective 
trades,  precisely  as  if  they  were  employed  in  private  industries. 
Most  of  the  plant  personnel  of  the  Government  Printing  Office 
at  Washington  and  of  the  Bureau  of  Engraving  and  Printing  in 
Washington,  and  almost  the  entire  mechanical  personnel  of  the 
various  arsenals  and  navy  yards  fall  under  this  category.  In 
addition  a  number  of  miscellaneous  field  employees  found 
at  various  points  throughout  the  country  are  members  of  the 
regular  trade  unions  of  their  class.  In  certain  towns,  where 
the  skilled  mechanics  of  a  given  class  are,  for  the  most  part, 
federal  employees  (as  is  the  case  in  certain  of  the  arsenal  and 
navy-yard  towns)  the  local  craft  unions  are  in  effect  unions 
of  federal  employees. 

All  the  postal  unions,  the  National  Federation  of  Federal 
Employees,  and,  needless  to  say,  all  the  craft  unions  to  which 
the  mechanical  employees  belong  are  affiliated  with  the  Ameri- 
can Federation  of  Labor.  It  thus  results  that  these  federal 
employees'  organizations  are  able,  to  a  certain  extent,  to  mar- 
shal behind  the  demands  or  requests  which  they  make  upon 
Congress  the  support  of  the  American  Federation  of  Labor. 
Legislative  Activities  of  Employees'  Organizations. — 
Until  within  the  last  few  years,  the  attempt  of  these  organiza- 
tions to  influence  Congressional  action  has  been  confined,  with 
insignificant  exceptions,  to  the  postal  service.  In  foreign  coun- 
tries also  it  has  almost  always  been  in  the  postal  service  that 
the  movement  for  the  organization  of  public  employees  and 
for  the  use  of  their  organized  political  power  has  first  devel- 
oped. The  industrial  character  of  the  postal  service,  as  con- 
trasted with  the  administrative  character  of  the  work  of  most 
government  services,  the  large  numbers  of  men  employed  in 
identical  operations,  and  their  distribution  over  every  part  of 
the  country,  are  the  obvious  reasons  for  this  phenomenon. 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  547 

In  1888  when  the  bill  providing  an  eight-hour  day  for  let- 
ter carriers  was  before  Congress,  it  had  the  active  support  of 
the  Knights  of  Labor,  then  occupying  a  place  in  the  labor 
movement  similar  to  that  now  held  by  the  American  Federa- 
tion of  Labor.  The  carriers  were  not  then  organized,  but  it 
was  generally  understood  that  in  return  for  the  support  of  the 
Knights,  the  carriers  would  support  the  candidates,  both 
national  and  local,  endorsed  by  the  Knights.^ 

In  the  following  year  a  national  organization  of  the  letter 
carriers  was  effected,  followed,  two  years  later,  by  the  forma- 
tion of  a  national  organization  of  the  railway  mail  clerks. 
Both  these  organizations,  however,  were  beneficial  in  char- 
acter. So  far  as  they  developed  any  interest  in  compensation 
or  working  conditions,  they  did  so  under  the  tutelage  of  the 
supervisory  officers  of  the  post  office  department.  Even  the 
selection  of  their  national  officers,  in  whom  the  active  direction 
of  the  organizations  was  vested,  was  largely  influenced  by 
the  department.  The  organization  of  post  office  clerks,  formed 
nine  years  later,  in  1900,  was  of  similar  character. 

Although  the  general  policy  of  the  three  organizations  men- 
tioned was  thus  a  passive  one,  the  demand  among  the  postal 
employees  for  a  revision  of  the  compensation  schedules  in 
force  was  so  insistent  that  the  organizations  perforce  put  their 
active  support  behind  the  bills  on  this  subject  which  were  in- 
troduced in  Congress  beginning  in  1898.  Despite  the  support 
of  the  American  Federation  of  Labor,  however,  the  organiza- 
tions found  themselves  unable  even  to  obtain  a  hearing  before 
the  Llouse  Committee  on  Post  Offices.  The  chairman  of  that 
committee,  E.  F.  Loud,  was  regarded  as  primarily  responsible 
for  the  attitude  of  the  committee;  and  an  agreement  appears 
to  have  been  reached  between  the  postal  organizations  and 
the  American  Federation  of  Labor  to  work  for  his  defeat  in 
the  1904  election.     Doubtless  largely  because  of  this  opposi- 

^  For  data  on  this  and  several  other  points  connected  with  the  early 
history  of  the  postal  organizations  the  writer  is  indebted  to  an  unpub- 
lished manuscript  by  Benjamin  Glassberg,  in  the  library  of  the  New 
York  Bureau  of  Municipal  Research,  dealing  with  the  organization  and 
political  activities  of  public  employees. 


548  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

tion,  Mr.  Loud  was  defeated.  This  represents  the  first  in- 
stance, and  one  of  the  few  instances,  in  which  a  member  of 
Congress  has  been  pubHcly  singled  out  for  defeat  by  the  or- 
ganized employees. 

The  activity  of  the  postal  organizations  in  connection  with 
the  salary  revision  legislation  was  regarded  as  improper  by 
President  Roosevelt,  and,  on  January  31,  1902,  he  issued  an 
executive  order  forbidding  all  officers  and  employees  "either 
directly  or  indirectly,  individually  or  through  associations,  to 
solicit  an  increase  of  pay  or  to  influence  or  attempt  to  influ- 
ence in  their  own  interests,  any  other  legislation  whatever, 
either  before  Congress  or  its  committees  or  in  any  way  save 
through  the  heads  of  departments  under  or  in  which  they  serve, 
on  penalty  of  dismissal  from  the  Government  service."  ^  It 
will  be  observed  that  this  order,  although  obviously  aimed  at 
organized  attempts  to  influence  legislation,  by  its  terms,  would 
seem  to  prohibit  the  individual  employee  from  soliciting  any  as- 
sistance from  his  Congressman  for  the  purpose  of  securing 
an  increase  in  pay.  In  this  field,  it  was  not  very  effective, 
though  it  did  have  some  influence  on  the  situation.  Even  with 
respect  to  the  activity  of  organizations  or  organized  groups 
it  was  not  scrupulously  observed ;  nevertheless,  it  constituted 
an  irritating  check  on  the  activities  of  those  organizations. 

By  order  of  November  26,  1908,  the  prohibition  was  made 
more  sweeping.     It  provided  that 

no  bureau,  office,  or  division  chief  or  subordinate  in  any  de- 
partment of  the  government,  and  no  officer  of  the  army  or 
navy  or  marine  corps  stationed  in  Washington,  shall  apply 
to  either  House  of  Congress,  or  to  any  Committee  of  either 
House  of  Congress,  or  to  any  Member  of  Congress,  for  leg- 
islation, or  for  appropriations,  or  for  Congressional  action  of 
any  kind,  except  with  the  consent  and  knowledge  of  the  head 
of  the  department;  nor  shall  any  such  person  respond  to  any 
request  for  information  from  either  House  of  Congress,  ex- 
cept through,  or  authorized  by,  the  head  of  his  department. 

*  Nineteenth  Report  of  the  United  States  Civil  Service  Commission 
(1902),  p.  75.  By  amendment  of  January  25,  1906,  this  order  was  ex- 
tended to  include  also  the  independent  establishments. 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  549 

It  will  be  seen  that  the  outstanding  addition  to  the  earlier 
order  was  that  the  employees  were  prohibited  from  communi- 
cation with  Congressmen  or  Congressional  committees  not 
merely  on  their  own  motion  but  also  in  response  to  requests 
for  information  which  might  originate  in  Congress,  its  com- 
mittees, or  with  individual  Congressmen, 

By  order  of  April  8,  1912,  the  preceding  orders  were  made 
less  rigorous  nominally,  not  by  withdrawing  the  prohibition  of 
communication  between  employees  and  Congress  but  by  pro- 
viding that  such  communications  "shall  be  transmitted  through 
heads  of  their  respective  departments  or  offices,  who  shall  for- 
ward them  without  delay  with  such  comment  as  they  may 
deem  requisite  in  the  public  interest,"  It  needs  but  slight 
familiarity  with  the  conditions  of  the  public  service  to  surmise 
that  there  would  be  few  instances  in  which  the  employee,  or 
even  a  group  of  employees,  would  venture  to  forward  through 
the  head  of  the  department  for  transmission  to  Congress  "with 
such  comments  as  he  might  deem  suitable,"  a  petition  or  re- 
quest which  they  knew  to  be  definitely  opposed  to  the  wishes 
of  the  head  of  the  department  or  indeed  of  their  immediate 
superior. 

The  severity  of  the  restrictions  imposed  by  these  orders 
upon  the  activities  of  the  postal  organizations  and  of  other 
less  formidable  groups  of  employees,  including  the  military  and 
naval  officers,  led  to  a  determined  effort  to  secure  their  repeal 
by  Congressional  action.  How  this  was  achieved  in  the  face  of 
the  orders  it  is  not  necessary  here  to  inquire;  but,  by  act  of 
August  24,  1912,  Congress  provided^  that  "the  right  of  per- 
sons employed  in  the  civil  service  of  the  United  States,  either 
individually  or  collectively,  to  petition  Congress  or  any  mem- 
ber thereof  or  to  furnish  information  to  either  House  of  Con- 
gress or  to  any  committee  thereof,  shall  not  be  denied  or  in- 
terfered with,"  ^ 

*  yj  Stat.  583.  This  provision  was  a  proviso  to  a  section  regulating 
the  procedure  to  be  followed  in  making  removals  from  the  classified 
service. 

'  The  section  also  provided  that  the  presenting  by  any  such  person 
or    groups    of    persons    (in    the    postal    service)    of    any    grievance    or 


550  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Meanwhile,  in  1905,  a  development  of  primary  importance 
had  occurred — the  formation  of  a  national  association  of  postal 
clerks  organized  along  trade  union  lines  with  the  specific  pur- 
pose of  working  for  improved  compensation  and  labor  con- 
ditions, and  affiliated  with  the  American  Federation  of  Labor. ^ 

The  organization  of  this  association,  "The  National  Fed- 
eration of  Post  Office  Clerks,"  represented  a  clear-cut  revolt 
against  the  policy  of  departmental  tutelage  and  non-affiliation 
which  characterized  the  United  Association  of  Post  Office 
Clerks  formed  five  years  before. 

The  postal  organizations,  since  their  first  activity  in  the 
late  nineties  in  connection  with  the  reclassification  bills  men- 
tioned above,  have  been  continuously  engaged  in  pushing 
legislation  affecting  compensation,  hours  of  labor,  and  working 
conditions  in  the  service.  For  some  years  the  policy  of  con- 
ciliating the  department  was  pursued  more  or  less  consistently 
by  the  officers  of  all  the  organizations  except  the  Post  Office 
Clerks'  Federation,  and  they  restricted  their  activity  to  the 
advocacy  of  measures  not  too  violently  opposed  by  the  depart- 
ment; but  in  1917,^  despite  the  well  known  opposition  of  the 
department,  both  the  carriers'  and  railway  mail  associations 
affiliated  with  the  American  Federation  of  Labor.  A  complete 
break  was  thus  made  from  the  tradition  of  departmental 
tutelage,  and  at  the  same  time  was  secured  a  most  effective 
ally  in  the  legislative  battle.     It  may  be  ventured  that  the  speed 

grievances  to  Congress  or  any  member  thereof,  should  not  be  cause  for 
reduction  in  rank  or  compensation,  or  removal.  This  provision,  how- 
ever, would  not  seem  to  have  been  unnecessary  in  view  of  the  general 
rule  applicable  to  the  entire  civil  service  above  cited. 

*  Already  in  1898,  in  the  Chicago  Post  Office,  always  a  storm  center 
in  movements  among  the  postal  employees,  the  clerks  had  formed  an 
organization  and  affiliated  themselves  with  the  Knights  of  Labor ;  and, 
two  years  later,  had  transferred  their  affiliation  to  the  growing  American 
Federation  of  Labor. 

*  The  United  Association  of  Post  Office  Clerks  also  sought  to  affiliate 
with  the  American  Federation  of  Labor  but  was  unable  to  do  so  because 
the  National  Federation  of  Post  Office  Clerks,  formed  in  1905,  was  al- 
ready aftiliated.  Several  unsuccessful  attempts  to  amalgamate  these  two 
organizations  have  been  made.  At  the  present  time  it  seems  likely  that 
the  Federation  will  gradually  absorb  the  Association.  The  Rural  Car- 
riers' Association  has  not  affiliated  with  the  American  Federation  of 
Labor,  nor,  as  may  be  inferred  from  the  character  of  its  membership,  is 
it  likely  to  do  so. 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  551 

and  smoothness  with  which  the  bill  creating  the  postal  salary 
reclassification  commission  in  19 19,  and  the  bill  embodying 
the  recommendations  of  that  commission  in  1920,  became  law 
were  due  in  no  small  measure  to  the  influence  which  the  co- 
operating postal  organizations  and  the  American  Federation  of 
Labor  were  able  to  exert  in  Congress. 

The  influence  in  Congress  of  employees'  organizations  af- 
filiated with  organized  labor  was  first  exerted  in  an  important 
way,  in  relation  to  branches  of  the  service  other  than  the 
postal  service,  in  191 5.  In  that  year,  under  the  urging  of 
the  American  Federation  of  Labor,  acting  at  the  instance  of 
the  International  Association  of  Machinists,  Congress  attached 
to  the  army  appropriation  bill  a  rider  prohibiting  the  use  of 
any  money  appropriated  therein  for  the  payment  of  any  em- 
ployee engaged  in  making  time  studies  or  speed  tests.  This 
provision  was  aimed  particularly  at  the  attempt  of  the  Chief 
of  Ordnance  to  apply  to  the  arsenals  the  methods  of  so-called 
"scientific  management."  The  provision  proving  only  partially 
effective,  it  was  superseded  in  19 16  by  an  act  directly  prohibit- 
ing the  use  of  the  stop  watch  or  any  other  time  measuring 
device  for  the  purpose  of  making  a  time  study  of  any  job 
of  any  employee  of  the  government.  Provisions  to  this  effect 
are  now  attached  to  the  annual  appropriation  acts  as  a  matter 
of  course. 

The  comprehensive  organizations  of  the  federal  employees 
not  members  of  organized  trades,  outside  the  postal  service, 
may  be  said  to  have  begun  in  19 16.  Prior  to  that  time  sporadic 
attempts  at  organization  had  been  made,  sometimes  with  an 
idea  of  permanence,  sometimes  merely  to  further  specific  meas- 
ures, such  as  retirement  legislation.  In  some  of  the  field 
services  organizations  or  particular  classes  of  employees  had 
developed  here  and  there,  such  as  the  association  of  store- 
keepers and  gaugers  in  the  customs  service,  composed  mostly 
of  minor  political  employees  and  having  mainly  a  political 
character.  None  of  these  organizations,  however,  made  any 
real  impression  upon  the  situation  or  endured  for  any  consid- 
erable length  of  time,  and  in  no  case  outside  the  postal  service 


552  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

was  tlie  attempt  made  to  organize  on  a  national  scale  embracing 
the  whole  of  the  serv'ice. 

In  191 5,  federal  employees  in  San  Francisco  founded  a 
local  organization  that  called  itself  the  "Federal  Employees' 
Union"  and  affiliated  with  the  American  Federation  of  Labor 
— a  step  wholly  novel  for  any  organization  of  federal  em- 
ployees outside  the  postal  service.  Its  example  was  imitated 
in  a  number  of  cities  and,  by  191 6,  no  less  than  fifty  differ- 
ent local  unions  of  federal  employees  had  sprung  up  all  affiliated 
with  the  American  Federation  of  Labor.  After  affiliation  with 
the  national  central  labor  body,  the  formation  of  a  national 
organization  of  federal  employees  was  a  natural  step  and  in 
191 6  the  National  Federation  of  Federal  Employees  was 
formed,  all  the  local  unions  of  federal  employees  becoming 
constituent  bodies  of  the  Federation  and  the  Federation  in  turn 
affiliating  itself  with  the  American  Federation  of  Labor. 

That  after  so  many  decades  of  relative  inactivity  among 
the  non-postal,  non-trade  employees  it  was  possible  within  a 
few  years  to  create  an  organization  on  a  national  scale  is,  in 
many  respects,  surprising.  Undoubtedly,  however,  the  time,  if 
not  ripe,  w'as  at  least  favorable  for  the  development  of  a  na- 
tional organization  of  the  federal  employees.  With  organiza- 
tion going  on  apace  in  every  branch  of  industry  and  in  state 
and  municipal  services  it  would  have  been  surprising  if  some 
substantial  progress  in  the  same  direction  had  not  been  made 
in  the  federal  service.  The  rapid  progress  is  to  be  attributed, 
however,  mainly  to  the  persistent  efforts  in  Congress  to  enact 
a  law,  particularly  obnoxious  to  the  employee,  providing  for  a 
minimum  eight-hour  day  in  the  departmental  offices  in  Wash- 
ington. This  particular  proposal  immediately  aligned  with 
the  employees'  organization  the  powerful  influence  of  the 
American  Federation  of  Labor,  in  whose  program  the  reduc- 
tion of  hours,  even  below  the  eight-hour  limit,  is  fore-shadowed 
and  which,  in  any  case,  would  necessarily  oppose  on  principle 
the  fixation  by  legislation  of  a  minimum  number  of  hours. 
Supported  by  the  American  Federation  of  Labor  the  organiza- 
tion, even  in  its  infancy,  was  able  to  make  a  demonstration 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  553 

of  effectiveness  in  preventing  the  enactment  of  this  legisla- 
tion which  immediately  attracted  the  attention  of  federal 
employees  the  country  over. 

The  growth  of  the  employees'  organizations  has  been  di- 
rectly and  unmistakably  reflected  in  the  growing  influence 
which  they  exercise  upon  legislation.  Particularly  has  this  been 
so  in  connection  with  the  National  Federation  of  Federal  Em- 
ployees. Two  important  measures  in  the  enactment  of  which 
the  influence  of  this  organization  was  distinctly  felt  were  the 
act  creating  the  Reclassification  Commission  and  the  act  estab- 
lishing a  retirement  system,  the  first  passed  by  the  Sixty-fifth 
and  the  second  by  the  Sixty-sixth  Congress.  The  retirement 
act  in  particular  may  be  said  to  have  been  forced  to  passage  by 
the  employees'  organizations.  Indeed,  in  the  report  sub- 
mitted to  the  Senate  by  the  Committee  on  Civil  Service  and 
Retrenchment  recommending  the  enactment  of  that  act,  the 
committee  made  repeated  reference  to  the  support  given  to 
various  provisions  of  the  bill  by  a  committee  of  employees 
whose  advice  it  had  sought  (which  committee  was  in  fact 
designated  by  the  employees'  unions)  and  made  no  reference 
whatever  to  any  support  given  to  any  particular  provision  of 
the  bill  either  by  any  administrative  officer  or  by  any  outside 
source  representing  citizen  interest.  The  instance  is  all  the 
more  significant  because  such  impartial  criticism  as  that  given 
to  the  measure  by  qualified  outside  organizations  was  sub- 
stantially unanimous  in  condemning  its  provisions  as  impro- 
vident and  not  developed  upon  a  sound  actuarial  basis. ^ 

While  the  methods  of  attack  of  all  the  employees'  organiza- 
tions is  substantially  the  same,  the  National  Federation  of 
Federal  Employees  appears  to  have  developed  its  tactics  more 
fully  than  any  of  the  other  organizations,  and  they  are  accord- 
ingly worthy  of  special  study.     The  constitution  of  the  organ- 

^  Repeated  reference  is  indeed  made  in  the  report  to  the  recommenda- 
tions made  and  data  supplied  by  a  certain  employee  of  the  Pension  Office, 
the  impHcation  being  that  this  individual  had  advised  the  Committee  in 
the  character  of  an  impartial  expert.  In  point  of  fact  the  employee  re- 
ferred to  was  one  of  the  most  important  and  active  members  both  of 
the  National  Federation  of  Federal  Employees  and  of  the  so-called  Em- 
ployees' Retirement  Conference. 


554  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

ization  declares  that  its  methods  for  obtaining  its  object  shall 
be  "by  petition  to  Congress,  by  creating  or  forcing  pul)lic  senti- 
ment favorable  to  proposed  reform,  by  cooperation  with  gov- 
ernment officials  and  employees,  by  legislation  and  other  lawful 
means."  It  is  the  "other  lawful  means"  that  are  most  sig- 
nificant for  the  purpose  under  discussion.  What  these  are  is 
well  illustrated  by  an  extract  from  the  report  of  the  legislative 
committee  of  the  Federation  to  its  annual  convention  in  1919: 
"Because  of  the  fact  that  residents  of  the  District  of  Columbia 
have  no  vote,  the  largest  Local  in  the  National  Federation, 
that  is,  the  organization  of  the  employees  in  the  Washington 
service,  has  the  least  direct  influence  upon  Congress.  The  Na- 
tional Legislative  Committee  pointed  out,  therefore,  to  officers 
of  the  local  the  importance  of  organizing  a  back  fire  upon  mem- 
bers of  Congress  by  friends  and  relatives  of  the  members 
of  the  local  who  are  voters  in  their  own  states.  The  union 
responded  promptly  to  this  and  is  now  making  a  detailed 
catalogue  of  its  members  according  to  Congressional  districts. 
This  will  unquestionably  augment  the  legislative  forces  of  the 
National  Federation  to  a  vast  degree."  ^  Instances  could 
readily  be  multiplied  from  the  literature  and  the  press  notices 
issued  by  the  organization  of  the  employment  of  similar  meth- 
ods. 

With  methods  of  this  kind  in  active  and  energetic  use  in 
the  hands  of  skilled  union  officers,  and  the  officers  of  the 
employees'  unions  have  unquestionably  displayed  a  high  type 
of  ability  in  this  field,  it  is  easy  to  believe  that  the  President 
of  the  National  Federation  is  not  overstating  the  case  when 
he  says  that  "in  Congress,  where  two  years  ago  a  favored  road 
to  cheap  popularity  was  sarcasm  at  the  expense  of  the  govern- 
ment employee,  the  few  members  who  now  indulge  such  tactics 
are  ridiculed  by  their  fellow^  members  and  rei)udiated  by  their 
political  parties.  The  Federation's  requests  are  listened  to  and 
its  support  is  sought  by  members  of  Congress  as  a  political 
asset."  2 

^  National  Federation  of  Federal  Eniploj-ees,  Report  of  the  President, 
Legislative  Committee  and  Secretary-Treasurer,  1919,  p.  5. 
'Ibid.,  p.   I. 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  555 

It  may  be  hazarded,  however,  that  the  employees'  unions 
themselves  could  not  have  built  up  the  important  influence 
which  they  now  exercise  through  their  own  members  alone, 
however  well  chosen  and  well  executed  the  methods  employed. 
Unquestionably  a  major  element  in  that  influence  has  been  the 
affiliation  of  those  unions  with  the  American  Federation  of 
Labor. 

Through  this  afiflliation  the  potential  power  of  that  organ- 
ization stands  behind  every  attempt  which  may  be  made  by 
the  employees'  unions  to  secure  favorable  Congressional  action 
in  matters  of  hours,  wages,  working  conditions,  etc.  The 
source  of  strength  in  the  American  Federation  in  Congress  is 
common  knowledge.  It  consists  in  the  ability  to  encompass,  or 
at  least  to  threaten,  the  defeat  for  reelection  of  almost  any 
member  of  Congress  who  comes  from  a  district  in  which  or- 
ganized labor  is  a  factor,  and  in  not  a  few  states  the  ability 
to  af^^ect  seriously  the  chances  of  reelection  of  a  Senator.  It  is 
not  commonly  appreciated  that  in  the  more  or  less  equal  division 
of  the  voting  strength  between  the  two  parties  that  normally 
prevails  in  most  districts  and  in  many  states,  an  organized 
group,  even  though  relatively  small,  which  is  able  to  throw  the 
entire  voting  power  of  its  membership  on  one  side  or  the  other 
of  the  scales,  is  a  factor  whose  importance  is  out  of  all  pro- 
portion to  its  relative  numbers  as  compared  with  the  entire 
voting  population  of  the  district  or  state.  It  thus  results 
that  to  an  increasing  degree  a  Congressman,  who  represents  a 
constituency  in  which  organized  labor  is  an  important  polit- 
ical factor,  opposes  the  wishes  of  the  employees'  unions  at 
his  peril ;  and  even  a  Senator  cannot  ignore  them  with  entire 
impunity. 

The  National  Federation  of  Federal  Employees,  up  to  the 
present  time,  has  made  perhaps  more  consistent  and  direct 
use  politically  of  its  affiliation  with  the  American  Federation 
of  Labor  than  have  the  postal  unions.  Nor  has  it  made  any 
attempt  at  concealment  of  this  cooperation.  Witness  the  fol- 
lowing from  an  article  in  the  official  organ  of  the  Federation 
by  its  President : 


556  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

What  has  the  National  Federation  of  Federal  Employees 
gained  by  its  affiliation  with  the  American  Federation  of  La- 
bor? I.  It  was  the  A.  F.  of  L.  that  at  the  beginning  of  our 
organization's  history  defeated  the  Borland  amendment  ^  the 
first  time  it  was  introduced  in  Congress.  Later  the  A.  F.  of  L., 
under  the  leadership  of  President  Gompers,  was  largely  in- 
strumental in  bringing  about  the  veto  by  President  Wilson 
of  the  Legislative  bill  because  it  contained  the  Borland  amend- 
ment. 

2.  It  was  the  membership  of  the  A.  F,  of  L.,  through  its 
affiliated  body,  the  Central  Labor  Union  of  Kansas  City,  that 
cast  the  votes  which  defeated  Representative  Borland  in  the 
primaries  in  his  district  in  191 8,  and  prevented  his  return  to 
Congress.  This  happened  because  we  were  affiliated  to  the 
A.  F.  of  L. 

3.  It  was  the  membership  of  the  A.  F.  of  L.,  through  its 
Central  Labor  Unions  in  every  state  that  asked  Congress,  at 
our  request,  to  grant  the  war  bonus,  first  of  $120  per  year, 
and  then  of  $240  per  year,  which  200,000  federal  employees 
are  now  receiving.  Those  central  labor  unions,  representing 
millions  of  votes  throughout  the  country,  helped  us  because  we 
were  affiliated  to  the  A.  F.  of  L.- 

Right  of  Employees'  Organization  to  Affiliate  with  Out- 
side Organizations. — The  right  of  federal  employees' 
unions  to  affiliate  with  the  American  Federation  of  Labor  is, 
so  far  as  the  postal  service  is  concerned,  now  recognized,  at 
least  impliedly,  by  statute.  Logically  the  same  principle  ex- 
tends to  all  other  classes  of  employees.  By  act  of  August  24, 
1912,^  Congress  provided  that  persons  in  the  postal  service 
should  not  be  reduced  in  rank  or  compensation  or  removed  be- 
cause of  "membership  in  any  society  or  association  or  other 
form  of  organization  of  postal  employees  not  affiliated  with 
any  outside  organization  imposing  an  obligation  or  duty  upon 
them  to  engage  them  in  strike  or  proposing  to  assist  them  in 
any  strike  against  the  United  States."  Since  the  terms  of 
affiliation  of  the  postal  unions  with  the  American  Federation 

*  An  amendment  to  an  appropriation  act  requiring  eight  hours'  labor 
by  all  employees. 

'"Our  Relations  with  the  A.  F.  of  L.."  bv  President  Luther  C. 
Steward,  N.  F.  F.  E.,  in  The  Federal  Employee,  November  29,  1919,  p.  2. 

'27   Stat.   555. 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  557 

of  Labor  do  not  require  them  to  engage  in  any  strike  against 
the  United  States,  nor  propose  that  the  American  Federation 
of  Labor  shall  assist  the  postal  unions  in  any  strike  against 
the  United  States,  this  condition  in  effect  legalizes  the  affilia- 
tion of  the  postal  unions  with  the  American  Federation  of 
Labor. 

During  the  debate  on  the  retirement  bill  in  1920  an  amend- 
ment was  moved  in  the  Senate  barring  from  the  benefits  of 
the  act  any  employee  who  was  a  member  of  any  organization 
of  government  employees  which  is  "affiliated  with,  subject  to, 
or  a  member  of,  or  component  part  of,  or  acknowledges  the 
authority  of,  any  higher  or  superior  body  or  institution  of  or- 
ganized labor."  ^ 

The  arguments  advanced  in  the  extended  speeches  made 
in  support  of  this  amendment  may  be  reduced  tO'  four :  first, 
that  the  American  Federation  of  Labor  had  taken  a  position 
against  the  government  in  the  steel  strike  and  the  coal  strike, 
and  that  affiliation  with  the  Federation,  therefore,  put  the 
employees  themselves  in  the  position  of  being  "against  the 
government" ;  second,  that  the  American  Federation  of  Labor 
was  a  class  organization  and  that  it  was  improper  for  a  mem- 
ber of  the  government  service  to  be  affiliated  with  an  organiza- 
tion which  represented  a  particular  class ;  third,  that  the  Ameri- 
can Federation  of  Labor  was  engaged  in  a  political  campaign 
against  the  Congressmen  and  Senators  who  had  incurred  its 
disfavor  by  their  votes  upon  legislation,  and  their  affiliation 
with  it,  therefore,  put  the  organized  federal  employees  in  the 
position  of  conducting  a  political  warfare  against  members  of 
Congress ;  and  fourth,  that  through  this  affiliation,  the  federal 
employees  were  attempting  to  coerce  Congress  into  the  en- 
actment of  legislation  favorable  to  their  own  interests. 

The  first  three  of  these  objections  are  beyond  the  range  of 
the  present  volume  and  merely  call  for  a  remark  upon  the 

*  Congressional  Record,  April  2,  1920,  p.  5530.  It  can  hardly  be  be- 
lieved that  the  enactment  of  this  resolution  was  really  expected  or  even 
hoped  for  by  its  mover.  Its  practice  would  have  meant  the ,  exclusion 
from  the  benefit  of  the  act  of  the  overwhelming  majority  of  the  employees 
of  the  government. 


558  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

pernicious  tendency  to  restrict  still  further  the  anomalous  posi- 
tion of  the  federal  employee  by  adding  to  the  restrictions  upon 
his  political  activity  restrictions  upon  his  expression  of  eco- 
nomic views.  The  last  objection  mentioned,  however,  is  ger- 
mane to  the  present  discussion. 

Right  of  Employees'  Organizations  to  Strike. — It  now 
remains  to  take  notice  of  a  question  which  is  now  and  again 
raised — the  right  of  the  federal  employees  to  strike.  Properly 
regarded,  this  is  not  a  problem  of  personnel  administration 
at  all.  The  threat  or  possibility  of  a  strike  in  any  branch  of 
the  federal  service  is  a  symptom  of  a  gravely  defective  system 
of  personnel  administration  in  that  branch.  Did  there  exist 
in  the  federal  service  a  well  designed  machinery  for  the  pre- 
sentation by  the  employees  of  their  views,  both  on  current 
minor  grievances  and  on  the  basic  questions  of  compensation, 
hours,  and  working  conditions,  and  an  impartial  administrative 
board  vested  with  adequate  authority  to  rectify  improper 
conditions,  thus  presented  to  it,  the  possibility  of  an  attempt 
to  strike  would  never  arise.  Even  under  present  conditions, 
where  virtually  no  machinery  exists,  where  in  certain  branches 
of  the  service  the  administrative  officers  have  flatly  refused 
even  to  discuss  matters  with  the  representatives  of  the  em- 
ployees' organizations,  and  where  relief  can  be  had  in  most 
cases  only  through  the  tedious  process  of  legislation,  there  has 
never  (except  perhaps  in  two  or  three  instances  so  peculiar  and 
doubtful  as  to  be  insignificant)  been  any  resort  to  the  strike 
weapon  by  the  federal  employees. 

If  the  experience  of  the  past  and  an  impartial  estimate 
of  the  present  situation  may  be  relied  on,  so  long  as  reasonably 
tolerable  compensation  and  working  conditions  are  provided 
in  the  federal  service,  there  is  no  danger  whatever  that  the 
question  of  the  right  of  federal  employees  to  strike  will  be- 
come a  practical  one.  For  the  present  it  seems  somewhat  ideal, 
therefore,  to  consider  the  controversial,  legal,  and  theoretical 
aspects  of  the  question.  Such  discussion  usually  tends,  more- 
over, to  obscure  rather  than  to  emphasize  the  need  of  the  de- 
velopment of  a  system  of  personnel  administration  which  will 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  559 

make  strikes  of  federal  employees  improbable  rather  than  il- 
legal. 

All  this  rests,  of  course,  on  the  assumption  that  the  wholly 
reasonable,  not  to  say  submissive,  temper  which  the  federal 
employees  have  consistently  manifested,  will  continue.  Should 
a  different  temper  develop  among  any  important  bodies  of 
federal  employees,  a  different  question  would  be  presented. 
There  is  little  likelihood  that  even  so  the  question  would  be 
raised  in  any  important  way  by  any  group  of  federal  employees 
in  the  ordinary  administrative  or  mechanical  branches,  since 
it  is  hardly  conceivable  that  the  government  would  be  coerced 
by  a  strike  or  threatened  strike  of  such  a  group.  It  is  only 
in  a  few  services,  of  which  the  postal  service  is  far  the  most 
important,  that  a  strike,  if  permitted,  might  actually  bring 
the  government  to  terms ;  and  it  is  only  in  such  services,  con- 
sequently, that  the  strike  weapon  would  be  likely  to  be  in- 
voked by  the  employees  under  any  circumstances.  Should  a 
disposition  ever  develop  among  the  employees  in  such  services 
to  use  the  strategic  power  which  their  employment  confers  upon 
them  to  enforce  demands  which  are  rejected  by  the  common 
judgment  of  the  nation,  there  will  be  presented  a  fundamental 
political  and  social  problem  which  lies  wholly  outside  the 
sphere  of  technical  personnel  administration  to  which  this 
problem  is  devoted,  in  the  contentious  realms  of  political  theory 
and  practical  politics. 

General  Conclusions  Regarding  Place  of  Employees' 
Organizations  in  a  Government  Personnel  System. — A 
situation  in  which  the  personnel  legislation  of  Congress  is 
shaped  largely  by  the  political  power  of  the  organized  em- 
ployees is  wholly  improper.  A  just  and  equitable  solution 
of  the  federal  personnel  question  is  not  to  be  expected  from 
the  action  of  Congress  or  a  committee  of  Congress  susceptible 
to  such  coercion.  The  employees  represent  a  special  interest, 
and  their  demands  by  no  means  may  l>e  consistent  in  all  cases 
with  public  interest.  It  is  idle  to  retort  that  the  public  should 
organize  itself  as  thoroughly  as  the  employees  to  oppose  such 
demands  of  special  interests  as  are  inconsistent  with  the  gen- 


56o  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

eral  public  interest.  No  general  public  interest  is  ever  organ- 
ized as  thoroughly  or  as  consistently  as  a  special  interest. 

On  the  other  hand,  to  condemn  the  employees  for  the  course 
they  have  taken  would  be  worse  than  futile.  Without  organiza- 
tion they  were  for  years  entirely  at  the  mercy  of  their  ad- 
ministrative superiors  apd  of  Congress,  and  in  large  measure 
they  still  are,  and,  as  a  study  of  subsequent  pages  will  show, 
their  interests  have  been  neglected  in  vital  respects.  Only 
through  organization  have  some  of  the  most  essential  improve- 
ments of  recent  years  been  effected. 

Again,  as  long  as  power  over  personnel  matters  is  wholly 
retained  in  the  hands  of  Congress,  the  employees  have  no 
alternative  but  to  organize  and  to  attempt  to  secure  from 
Congress  the  enactment  of  what  they  regard  as  their  just  de- 
mands. Congress,  however,  has  been  notoriously  slow  to  act 
in  personnel  matters  when  impelled  merely  by  the  force  of 
right  reason,  but  notoriously  quick  to  act  when  its  members 
fear  that  the  effect  of  their  inaction  may  be  reflected  in  the 
ensuing  election  returns.  It  is  thus  wholly  natural  and  in- 
evitable that  the  employees  should  seek  to  influence  Congres- 
sional action  by  the  quicker  and  more  certain  methods. 

The  remedy  for  the  wholly  undesirable  relationship  that 
now  exists  between  the  employees'  unions  and  Congress  is  to 
be  found  unquestionably  only  in  the  delegation  by  Congress  of 
virtually  all  its  present  control  over  personnel  matters  to  an 
administrative  body,  the  members  of  which,  on  the  one  hand, 
would  not  be  subject  as  are  the  members  of  Congress  to  political 
pressure  from  the  employees,  and  on  the  other  hand,  would 
be  free  from  domination  by  the  administration.  Despite  their 
increasing  success  in  securing  desired  legislation  from  Con- 
gress, the  employees'  organizations,  or  at  least  the  National 
Federation  of  Federal  Employees,  have  themselves  recognized 
the  impropriety  of  Congressional  regulations  of  personnel  mat- 
ters in  detail.  The  National  Federation  has  stood  consistently 
for  the  development  in  the  government  of  a  central  personnel 
agency  vested  with  large  powers  over  personnel  matters,  sub- 
stantially as  herein  urged. 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  561 

Nor  must  it  be  thought  that  because  exception  has  been 
taken  on  principle  to  the  poHtical  activity  of  employees'  organ- 
izations, criticism  is  intended  of  the  specific  measures  for  whose 
enactment  the  employees'  organizations  have  been  more  or  less 
completely  responsible.  With  the  single  exception  of  the  Re- 
tirement Act,  the  measures  contended  for  by  the  employees' 
organizations  have  been  in  the  main  well  considered,  and  would 
long  ago  have  been  placed  upon  the  statute  books  without  the 
intervention  of  the  employees,  had  Congress  had  a  correct 
understanding  of  the  personnel  problem.  It  is  rather  to  the 
future  that  the  exception  herein  taken  to  the  continuance  of 
political  activity  on  the  part  of  employees'  organizations  is 
directed. 

Employees'  Committees. — The  desirability  of  providing 
some  machinery  by  which  the  opinions  of  the  body  of  the  sub- 
ordinate personnel  on  matters  of  personnel  administration  may 
be  authoritatively  brought  before  the  responsible  administra- 
tive officer  is  obvious.  Where  the  service  is  small,  a  formal 
machinery  for  securing  such  an  expression  of  opinion  may 
not  be  necessary.  As  soon  as  a  service  reaches  any  considerable 
size,  however,  conditions  change  and  the  institution  of  formal 
machinery  for  the  securing  of  an  authoritative  and  general 
expression  of  opinion  becomes  desirable. 

In  general  it  may  be  said  that  the  system  of  personnel 
administration  now  in  force  in  the  federal  service  is  auto- 
cratic. Only  here  and  there  has  provision  been  made  whereby 
the  rank  and  file  may  be  given  an  opportunity  even  to  express 
themselves  with  respect  to  the  conditions  under  which  they 
work,  much  less  to  have  any  voice  in  determining  those  con- 
ditions. In  the  smaller  services  the  absence  of  any  formal  pro- 
vision of  this  kind  has  not  been  felt  keenly  because  the  in- 
formal contact  between  the  directing  and  the  subordinate  per- 
sonnel has  served,  however  imperfectly,  a  similar  purpose.  In 
the  larger  services,  however,  of  which  the  postal  service  is  the 
outstanding  example,  the  total  absence  of  provision  for  confer- 
ence between  the  rank  and  file  and  the  management  which  now 
exists  is  rarely  found  in  the  more  progressive  industrial  con- 
cerns of  the  country. 


562  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Existing  Machinery  for  Employees'  Representation. — The 
progress  which  has  been  made  up  to  the  present  time  in  the 
federal  service  in  the  development  of  official  machinery  for 
conference  is  minor.  In  some  of  the  administrative  branches 
there  has  long  been  in  vogue  the  institution  of  the  staff  con- 
ference, in  which  all  the  employees,  or,  as  more  commonly 
happens,  all  above  the  routine  grades,  are  periodically  as- 
sembled by  the  chief  for  the  more  or  less  free  discussion  of 
service  matters.  Aside  from  these,  which  can  be  regarded 
as  falling  under  the  head  of  conference  machinery  only  by 
courtesy,  the  actual  experiments  in  conference  machinery  in 
the  federal  service  are  so  few  that  they  can  be  specially 
enumerated. 

In  the  navy  yards  since  shortly  after  the  outbreak  of  the 
war  the  mechanical  employees  have  had  representation  on  the 
so-called  wage  boards.  The  function  of  these  boards  is  limited 
to  the  collection  of  data  concerning  the  compensation  rates 
paid  in  similar  employments  in  private  industry.  At  this 
writing  there  has  yet  displayed  itself  no  tendency  towards  the 
development  of  these  wage  boards  into  conference  committees 
of  general  jurisdiction. 

Undoubtedly  the  most  complete  and  thoroughgoing  action 
in  the  direction  of  creating  conference  machinery  in  the  federal 
service  thus  far  taken  was  that  taken  by  the  Commanding 
Officer  of  the  Rock  Island  Arsenal  (Colonel  Harry  B.  Jordan), 
on  July  I,  1 9 19.  By  an  order  issued  on  that  date  there  was 
created  in  the  arsenal  a  central  council  composed  of  three  em- 
ployees from  each  department,  this  council  to  select  from  its 
number  five  members  to  meet  with  the  commanding  officer  and 
four  officers  appointed  by  the  commanding  officer  as  the  rep- 
resentatives of  the  management,  in  a  so-called  Joint  Confer- 
ence Committee.  In  addition  the  three  representatives  from 
each  department  are  constituted  a  departmental  committee  to 
confer  with  the  head  of  the  department  on  departmental  mat- 
ters. 

From  all  reports  the  institution  of  this  system  of  organized 
machinery  for  conference  between  the  employees  and  the  man- 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  563 

agement  has  had  the  happiest  results  not  merely  in  eliminating 
causes  of  dissatisfaction  on  the  part  of  the  employees  but  in 
enlisting  the  employees  as  a  constructive  force  in  the  manage- 
ment with  resulting  increased  production. 

Particularly  interesting  in  connection  with  the  Rock  Island 
machinery  is  the  decision  of  the  temporary  conference  com- 
mittee handed  down  on  August  14,  19 19,  shortly  after  the 
act  of  personal  selection  of  representatives  to  the  council  had 
been  held: 

The  Temporary  Conference  Committee  having  been  asked 
for  a  ruling  on  the  eligibility  of  foremen  to  represent  em- 
ployees on  the  Central  Council  is  unanimously  of  the  follow- 
ing opinion : 

The  Central  Council  is  wholly  an  organization  of  employ-, 
ees,  intended  to  represent  the  point  of  view  and  needs  of  the 
employees  to  the  management.  It  would,  therefore,  mani- 
festly take  away  from  the  Council  its  representative  charac- 
ter if  members  of  the  managerial  force  were  upon  it.  Con- 
sequently, it  is  now  definitely  agreed  between  the  Temporary 
Conference  Committee  and  the  Commanding  Officer  that  no 
person  having  supervisory  power  with  the  power  of  recom- 
mending employment  or  discharge  shall  be  eligible  to  act  as 
departmental  representative  on  the  Central  Council. 

The  action  taken  in  the  Rock  Island  Arsenal  has  not  yet 
been  extended  even  to  the  other  arsenals  operated  by  the 
Ordnance  Department,  nor  has  the  Secretary  of  War  as  yet 
seen  fit  to  impose  the  same  plan  upon  the  other  industrial 
services  under  his  direction. 

In  the  non-industrial  units  there  does  not  yet  appear  to  be 
any  significant  development  of  official  machinery  for  confer- 
ence with  employees.  A  comprehensive  plan  of  this  kind  was 
proposed,  indeed,  for  one  of  the  largest  of  the  non-industrial 
units,  the  Bureau  of  War  Risk  Insurance,  in  1919,  but  owing  to 
the  instability  of  the  personnel  of  the  organization  at  that 
time  the  proposed  plan  was  eventually  abandoned.  The  plan 
was  sponsored  by  the  National  Federation  of  Federal  Em- 
ployees, and  it  is  worthy  of  note  that  it  provided  for  the  selec- 
tion of  the  employee  representatives  not  by  the  general  body  of 


5^4  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

employees  but  by  the  War  Risk  Branch  of  the  Federal  Em- 
ployees' Union.  It  further  provided  that  the  President  of 
the  National  Federation  of  Federal  Employees  should  be  ex 
officio  Chairman  of  the  employees'  delegation  on  the  confer- 
ence committee.  It  is  believed  that  this  proposed  plan 
embodies  clearly  the  defects  inhering  in  the  system  of 
conference  machinery  based  upon  unofficial  employees'  organi- 
zations. 

Attitude  of  Reclassification  Commission  in  Respect  to 
Employees'  Representation. — To  the  Joint  Congressional 
Commission  on  Reclassification  of  Salaries  in  the  District  of 
Columbia  belongs  the  distinction  of  having  been  the  first 
federal  organization  to  make  definite  provision  for  a  general 
system  of  employees'  conference  machinery.  At  the  outset 
of  its  work  in  the  spring  of  191 9,  the  Commission  ar- 
ranged for  the  selection  of  conference  committees  of  employees 
for  the  several  departments  and  services  and  also  for  the  more 
important  specific  classes  of  employment  over  the  whole  service. 
Many  of  these  committees,  especially  those  representing  par- 
ticular classes  of  employment,  were  active  throughout  the  work 
of  the  Commission  and  rendered  great  assistance.  In  the 
formation  of  the  central  departmental  committees,  the  Commis- 
sion permitted  the  officers  of  the  National  Federation  of  Fed- 
eral Employees  to  designate  the  employee  representatives,  in- 
stead of  resorting  to  a  general  election. 

The  Reclassification  Commission,  furthermore,  has  gone  on 
record  as  definitely  favoring  a  system  of  "personnel  commit- 
tees," by  which  presumably  are  meant  conference  committees. 
The  Commission  recommends  that  "one-half  of  the  members 
of  each  personnel  committee  shall  be  selected  by  and  from 
among  employees  exercising  supervisory  powers  within  the 
department  or  unit  thereof  and  the  remaining  members  shall 
be  selected  by  and  from  among  employees  not  exercising  such 
supervisory  powers."  ^  The  Commission  also  recommends  the 
establishment  of  a  board  to  be  known  as  the  Civil  Service 
Advisory  Council  to  be  composed  of  twelve  members,  six  to 

*  Report  of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  Part  I,  p.  142. 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  565 

be  appointed  by  the  President  from  among  the  employees  above 
the  rank  of  division  chief,  the  remaining  six  to  be  selected 
by  the  employees  (two  from  among  the  manual  employees,  two 
from  among  the  clerical  employees,  and  two  from  among  the 
scientific  and  professional  employees).^ 

,  It  will  thus  be  seen  that,  according  to  the  recommenda- 
tions of  the  Reclassification  Commission,  while  the  "person- 
nel committees"  are  to  be  constituted  on  departmental  lines, 
the  employees'  representation  on  the  "advisory  council"  is  to 
disregard  those  lines  entirely  and  be  based  upon  the  division 
of  the  employees  into  groups  by  character  of  employment. 
Aside  from  the  fact  that  the  three  groups  mentioned  are  by 
no  means  comprehensive  in  their  relation  to  the  whole  service, 
it  is  difficult  to  see  why  the  Commission  proposes  an  entirely 
new  basis  of  representation  in  the  council  instead  of  allowing 
the  council  to  be  built  up  upon  the  departmental  personnel  com- 
mittees. Particularly  does  this  seem  inconsistent  in  view  of 
the  function  which  the  Commission  assigns  to  the  personnel 
committees.  The  important  part  which  such  committees  can 
and  should  play  in  the  day  to  day  administration  in  the  sev- 
eral departments  and  subordinate  units  through  the  confer- 
ence with  the  departmental  and  division  officers  is  apparently 
lost  sight  of,  the  recommendation  being  merely  that  to  the 
extent  that  the  Civil  Service  Commission  "may  deem  proper, 
it  may  by  rule  or  regulation  provide  that  any  grievance,  dis- 
pute, or  other  matter  arising  in  any  department  or  unit  thereof 
shall  be  conciliated  by  the  personnel  committee."  But  on  the 
substantive  matters  of  personnel  policy  and  working  conditions, 
the  recommendation  merely  is  that  "it  shall  be  the  duty  of 
each  personnel  committee  from  time  to  time  to  make  sugges- 
tions and  recommendations  to  the  council."  It  is  a  question 
whether  the  function  of  such  a  committee  should  not  be  to 
make  recommendations  of  this  character  first  to  the  depart- 
mental officers  concerned,  the  council  being  brought  into  play 

^  Ibid.,  p.  141.  The  recommendations  also  provide  for  at  least  one 
of  the  six  members  appointed  by  the  President  to  be  a  woman  and  one 
of  the  two  members  appointed  by  the  three  groups  of  employees  to  be 
a  woman. 


566  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

only  when  the  departmental  officers  lind  themselves  unable  or 
unwilling  to  meet  the  views  of  the  departmental  employees. 

An  interesting  minor  provision  contained  in  the  recom- 
mendations of  the  commission  is  that  "members  of  the  council 
shall  be  allowed,  subject  to  such  regulations  as  the  Civil  Service 
Commission  may  prescribe,  a  reasonable  amount  of  time  away 
from  the  regular  duties  of  their  positions  without  loss  of  com- 
pensation when  necessary  in  order  to  enable  them  to  attend 
the  meetings  of  the  council  or  to  perform  other  duties  as 
members  thereof."  The  Commission  does  not  make  a  similar 
recommendation  with  respect  to  members  of  the  personnel 
committee,  though  a  similar  provision  is  obviously  equally 
called  for. 

Machinery  for  Conference  in  the  British  Service. — In  the 
civil  service  of  Great  Britain  conference  machinery  has  reached 
a  high  degree  of  development.  As  in  this  country  the  first 
development  was  in  the  industrial  establishments  of  the  gov- 
ernment. On  July  I,  19 1 8,  the  War  Cabinet  decided  to  adopt 
in  principle  the  application  of  the  recommendations  of  the 
Whitley  Report,  with  any  necessary  adaptations  to  govern- 
mental industrial  establishments  where  the  conditions  were 
sufficiently  analogous  to  those  existing  in  outside  industries. 
Conference  Committees  now  exist  in  virtually  all  the  govern- 
ment local  industrial  establishments,  and  departmental  confer- 
ence committees,  known  as  departmental  joint  councils  also 
exist  in  each  of  the  departments  having  such  industrial  estab- 
lishments under  its  jurisdiction.  There  has  not  as  yet  been 
developed,  however,  any  conference  bodies  covering  all  the 
departments  of  the  government  having  industrial  establish- 
ments. This  fact  is  interesting  as  emphasizing  the  fact  that 
the  primary  field  for  the  activity  of  conference  machinery  is 
in  the  local  establishments  and  their  subdivisions,  and  it  is 
only  after  the  principle  has  been  effectively  applied  locally  that 
it  can  be  extended  with  much  result  to  the  larger  units — the 
department  and  the  service  as  a  whole. 

The  standard  constitution  adopted  for  the  conference  ma- 
chinery of  the  several  industrial  establislinients  differs  widely 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  567 

from  that  established  at  the  Rock  Island  Arsenal.  In  the 
first  place  the  committees  are  constituted  not  merely  for  each 
department  of  the  establishment  but  for  each  shop.  In  the 
second  place  it  is  provided  that  all  these  committees  "shall  con- 
sider only  matters  of  a  general  nature."  ^  Matters  that  are 
regarded  ordinarily  as  exclusively  trade  questions,  such  as 
wages,  piece  prices,  shop  rules  in  relation  to  union  rules,  etc., 
fall  under  the  jurisdiction  of  an  entirely  distinct  committee 
known  as  the  "Trade  Committee."  The  final  point  of  differ- 
ence is  that  both  the  shop,  department,  and  works  committees 
on  the  one  hand  and  the  trade  committees  on  the  other  are 
composed  of  representatives  or  stewards  of  the  trade  unions 
having  members  employed  in  the  shop.  In  short,  the  trade 
union  has  been  accepted  as  the  sole  and  complete  basis  for  em- 
ployees' representation. 

The  emphasis  upon  the  trade  as  opposed  to  the  organiza- 
tion unit  as  the  basis  of  employees'  representation  and  of  con- 
ference  machinery   is    further   emphasized   by   the    fact   that 

'  The  following  are  specified  as  being  matters  "of  a  general  nature." 

(a)  The  issue  and  revision  of  works  rules. 

(b)  The  distribution  of  working  hours;  breaks;  time  recording, 

etc. 

(c)  The  payment  of  wages   (time,  form  of  pay  ticket,  etc.)  ;  ex- 

planation of   methods   of   payment. 

(d)  The  settlement  of   grievances ;   other  than   those   of   a   spe- 

cific trade  character. 

(e)  Holiday  arrangements. 

(/)  Questions  of  physical  welfare  (provision  of  meals,  drinking 
water,  lavatories  and  washing  accommodation,  cloakrooms, 
ventilation,  heating  and  sanitation ;  accidents,  safety  ap- 
pliances, first  aid,  ambulance,  etc.). 

(g)   Questions  of  promotion,  position  of  foremen,  etc. 

(h)  Questions  of  discipline  and  conduct  as  between  management 
and  workpeople  (malingering,  bullying,  time-keeping; 
publicity  in  regard  to  rules ;  supervision  of  notice  boards, 
etc.). 

(0   Terms  of  engagement  of  workpeople. 

(/)  The  training  of  apprentices  and  young  persons. 

(k)  Technical  library,  lectures  on  the  technical  and  social  as- 
pects of  industry. 

(/)    Suggestions    of    improvements   in    method    and    organization 
of  work;  the  testing  of  suggestions. 
(m)  Investigation   of   circumstances  tending  to   reduce   efficiency 
or  in  any  way  to  interfere  with  the  satisfactory  working 
of  the  establishments. 

(n)   Collections   (for  clubs,  charities,  etc.). 

(0)   Entertainments  and  sports. 


568  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

though  no  central  body  covering  all  the  industrial  establish- 
ments in  the  government  service  has  yet  been  formed  there 
are  being  developed  trade  councils  having  jurisdiction  over 
all  the  trade  committees  of  a  given  trade  in  all  the  industrial 
establishments  over  the  whole  service.  The  Ministry  of  Labour 
and  the  Treasury  are  also  represented  on  these  trade 
councils.^ 

Separate  provision  has  been  made  for  the  organization  of 
conference  machinery  for  the  non-industrial  branches  of  the 
service.  To  these  the  name  of  "Administrative  and  Legal 
Departments  of  the  Civil  Service"  have  been  applied.  It  is  in- 
teresting to  note  that  here  the  first  body  to  be  created  was 
the  service-wide  body  covering  all  departments.  This  is 
known  as  the  "National  Council  for  the  Administrative  and 
Legal  Departments  of  the  Civil  Service."  In  addition,  de- 
partmental machinery  has  been  set  up  in  no  less  than  62  de- 
partments according  to  the  latest  information.  It  does  not 
appear  that  the  development  has  proceeded  as  yet  to  any  level 
below  that  of  the  department  itself.  It  is  to  be  recalled,  how- 
ever, that  in  the  British  government  the  departments  are  in 
many  cases  no  more  significant  units  of  organization  than  are 
bureaus  in  our  own  system. 

Perhaps  the  most  striking  thing  about  the  scheme  of  or- 
ganization provided  for  the  departmental  council  is  that  mem- 
bership in  associations  of  employees  instead  of  employment 
is  made  the  basis  for  representation.  The  employee  representa- 
tives are  to  consist  "of  members  of  the  associations  or  groups 
of  associations  having  members  employed  in  the  department." 
It  is  provided  further  than  even  "where  an  association  has 
members  outside  as  well  as  inside  the  department  the  electors 
for  the  department  shall  be  the  members  of  the  association 
in  the  department."  It  is  specifically  left  open  to  the  electors 
so  constituted  "to  use  as  their  representative  any  member  or 
official  in  the  association  who  is  employed  in  the  civil  service, 
or  if  not  a  person  so  employed  a  full-time  officer  of  the  asso- 

"  '  The  Ministry  of  Labour  is  represented  likewise  on  the  departmental 
council. 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  569 

ciation.     The  election  shall  in  all  cases  be  under  the  authority 
of  the  association  itself." 

The  National  Council  for  the  Administrative  and  Legal 
Departments,  promptly  upon  its  organization,  appointed  several 
committees,  of  which  the  most  important  is  the  committee  on 
the  organization  of  the  civil  service.  This  committee  rendered 
on  February  17,  1920,  a  brief  report  dealing  with  the  whole 
organization  of  the  civil  service,  a  most  interesting  document, 
not  only  because  of  the  substantive  recommendations  which 
it  makes,  but  because  it  supplements  the  several  reports  of 
Royal  Commissions  on  the  Civil  Service.  In  contrast  with 
those  reports,  which  are  based  upon  extensive  testimony  taken 
by  commissioners  not  themselves  in  intimate  contact  with  the 
services,  this  report  embodies  the  result  of  the  actual  ex- 
perience of  the  members  of  the  committee  in  the  Civil  Service. 
Particularly  interesting  are  the  divergencies  of  opinion  which 
developed  between  the  members  of  the  council  representing  the 
management  and  those  representing  the  employees.^ 
Composition  of  Employees'  Committees. — Like  most  other 
organization  phases  of  the  personnel  system  the  organization 
of  machinery  for  conference  with  the  employees  should  be 
developed  along  both  structural  and  functional  lines;  that  is 
to  say,  conference  machinery  should  be  provided  for  all  the 
employees  in  each  unit  of  organization  regardless  of  the  char- 
acter of  their  employment,  and  supplementary  machinery 
should  be  organized  whereby  all  those  following  a  given  em- 
ployment, either  over  the  service  as  a  whole,  or  in  major 
groups  of  organization  units,  may  also  be  enabled  to  confer 
regarding  matters  especially  concerning  that  employment.  The 
size  of  the  primary  unit  of  representation  for  which  machinery 
shall  be  organized  and  the  several  intermediate  bodies  between 
the  primary  unit  and  the  final  body  are  matters  which  cannot 
be  arbitrarily  or  categorically  defined  but  must  be  determined 
for  each  branch  of  the  organization  in  the  light  of  conditions 
there  obtaining. 

*  Civil  Service  National  Whitley  Council,  Report  of  the  Joint  Com- 
mittee on  the  Organization  of  the  Civil  Service,  1920,  Document  No.  3804. 


570  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

When  the  work  of  organizing  political  machinery  for  con- 
ference is  undertaken,  especial  care  must  be  taken  that  the 
machinery  shall  actually  function,  that  is  to  say,  that  it  shall 
really  succeed  in  securing  an  authoritative  expression  of  em- 
ployees' opinion.  The  danger  in  any  system  of  conference 
machinery  organized  by  the  management  is  that  even  with  the 
best  intentions  the  management  may  so  obtrude  itself  into 
the  picture  that  unconsciously  it  dominates  the  selection  of 
the  employees'  representatives  and  checks  the  free  expression 
of  employee  opinion.  To  prevent  such  a  result  from  ensuing 
the  management  should  withdraw  entirely  from  the  proceedings 
at  the  earliest  possible  stage  in  the  organization  process.  'The 
time  and  place  of  employee  meetings,  at  which  representatives 
are  elected  and  instructed,  are  not  without  their  influence  in 
this  connection.  The  administrator  sincerely  desirous  of  ob- 
taining a  really  frank  expression  of  employee  opinion  will  so 
arrange  in  these  respects  that  the  presence  and  the  influence 
of  the  management  is  felt  as  little  as  possible  if  at  all. 

Another  error  to  be  avoided  in  the  development  of  confer- 
ence machinery  is  the  inclusion  with  the  subordinate  employees 
of  the  intermediate  directing  personnel.  Invariably  this  leads 
to  constraint  on  the  part  of  subordinate  employees.  A  com- 
mon form  which  this  error  assumes  is  that  of  the  so-called 
"staff  conference"  in  which  representatives  of  all  the  different 
grades  of  employees  meet  together  in  conference  with  the  head 
of  the  organization  without  any  of  the  groups  having  had 
any  opportunity  to  meet  individually  in  advance  and  instruct 
their  representatives. 

The  Function  of  Employees'  Committees. — The  line  be- 
tween mere  representation  of  employees  on  conference  com- 
mittees and  their  actual  participation  in  the  making  of  ad- 
ministrative decisions  affecting  personnel  matters  is,  in  private 
industry,  not  an  easy  one  to  draw.  Even  though  the  function 
of  the  employees'  committee  be  nominally  that  of  advice  only, 
there  is  apt  to  be  manifest  an  unexpressed  but  nevertheless 
real  threat  that  if  the  wishes  of  the  employees  are  not  met  a 
strike  may  result.    To  this  extent  any  plan  for  conference  with 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  571 

employees  involves  to  a  greater  or  less  degree  the  actual  par- 
ticipation by  the  employees  in  the  making  of  the  decision,  the 
degree  of  participation  being  determined  by  the  actual  strength 
of  the  employees  and  their  ability  to  compel  acceptance  of 
their  demands  if  it  is  necessary.  In  the  public  service  the 
same  situation  hardly  exists  except  perhaps  in  the  industrial 
establishments  in  which  the  questions  raised  by  conference 
committees  are  in  a  great  many  cases  not  peculiar  to  the  gov- 
ernment establishment  but  are  general  trade  questions  affecting 
also  those  employed  in  that  trade  in  private  industry.  In  the 
non-industrial  branches  of  the  service,  however,  the  chances 
that  the  employees  could  or  would  strike  are  so  slight  that,  for 
practical  purposes,  they  may  be  neglected  by  the  administra- 
tive officer.  In  these  branches  of  the  service,  therefore,  mere 
representation  of  the  employees  carries  with  it  no  implica- 
tion of  actual  participation  in  the  management.  If  it  is  de- 
sired to  award  any  such  participation  to  the  employee,  it  must 
be  done  expressly. 

The  question  of  what  further  share,  if  any,  may  be  awarded 
to  the  rank  and  file  in  the  substantive  administration  of  the 
federal  business  is  one  which,  in  the  present  state  of  affairs, 
is  so  entirely  academic  and  speculative  that  present  discussion 
is  hardly  warranted.  None  of  the  employees'  organizations 
appears  as  yet  to  have  developed  even  the  beginnings  of  a 
program  in  this  direction. 

Employees'  Organizations  as  Representatives  of  Em- 
ployees before  Management. — The  dangers  of  domination 
by  the  management  that  are  inherent  in  every  system  of 
conference  machinery  set  up  by  the  management  itself  has 
led  some  to  take  the  view  that  the  free  and  authoritative 
expression  of  employees'  opinions  can  be  obtained  only  when 
the  management,  instead  of  itself  setting  up  conference  ma- 
chinery by  administrative  action,  enters  into  conference  ar- 
rangements with  employees'  organizations  or  unions  already 
formed  independently  of  the  management.  The  outstanding 
respect  in  which  an  arrangement  of  this  kind  is  likely  to  be 
superior     to     a     system     set     up     by     the     management     is 


572  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

that  the  independent  associations  or  unions  of  employees 
may  have,  and  usually  do  have,  leaders  who  are  not  themselves 
employed  in  the  particular  organization  unit,  or  perhaps  in  the 
service  at  all,  and  who,  therefore,  can  meet  the  executives  in 
conference  with  greater  freedom  and  boldness  on  behalf  of 
the  employees.  It  is  believed,  however,  that  this  view  has 
far  more  validity  in  the  field  of  private  industry  than  in  the 
federal  service.  Unless  it  is  to  be  assumed,  as  it  should  not 
be,  that  the  employees  are  prepared  to  back  up  the  demands 
which  they  put  forth  in  conference  by  a  strike,  it  is  clear 
that  nothing  can  be  accomplished  except  through  a  cooperative 
attitude  on  the  part  of  the  officer  in  charge.  If  such  a  co- 
operative and  sympathetic  attitude  exists,  there  will  be  no 
reason  ordinarily  why  the  employees'  representatives,  even 
though  they  are  themselves  employed  in  the  organization, 
should  have  any  hesitancy  about  putting  their  demands  for- 
ward. 

The  difficulty  in  the  federal  service  or  in  any  public  service, 
of  according  to  any  organization  standing  outside  the'  service 
the  right  to  speak  for  the  employees  is  that  membership  in 
such  organization  almost  invariably  involves  the  payment  of 
dues  and,  quite  frequently,  the  liability  to  additional  assess- 
ment for  special  purposes  from  time  to  time.  Almost  in- 
variably also,  especially  when,  as  in  the  case  of  the  National 
Federation  of  Federal  Employees  and  of  all  the  postal  unions, 
the  organization  is  affiliated  with  organized  labor  generally, 
membership  involves  also  a  certain  measure  of  financial,  or 
at  any  rate  moral,  support  of  movements  and  principles  which 
have  no  direct  connection  with  federal  employment.  For 
these  reasons  it  seems  manifestly  improper  for  the  federal 
service  to  require  of  an  employee,  as  a  condition  to  his  ob- 
taining permission  to  participate  in  the  selection  and  instruc- 
tion of  conference  representatives  and  the  like,  that  he  assume 
these  wholly  external,  and  from  the  official  standpoint  wholly 
irrelevant,  financial  and  moral  obligations. 

Even  aside  from  this  aspect  of  the  case,  however,  em- 
ployees' organizations  are  not  in  their  nature  fully  efficient 


EMPLOYEES'  ORGANIZATIONS  573 

as  a  medium  of  conference.  In  all  such  organizations  there 
is  an  insistent  pressure  at  all  times  to  build  up  the  organiza- 
tion. The  result  of  this  is  to  lay  emphasis  on  those  factors 
and  forces  which  are  common  to  the  service  as  a  whole  and 
to  neglect  the  peculiar  and  special  conditions  obtaining  in  the 
several  branches  and  subordinate  organization  units.  It  is 
precisely  in  these  minor  divisions  of  the  service,  however, 
that  conference  machinery  most  needs  to  be  consistently  de- 
veloped. 

There  is  another  danger  here,  moreover,  that  needs  to 
be  guarded  against  fully  as  carefully  as  the  danger  of  official 
interference  where  the  system  of  selection  is  official.  This  is 
the  danger  that  the  control  of  the  employees'  organizations 
will  tend  to  concentrate  itself  in  the  hands  of  professional 
union  officers.  When  a  union  is  developed  without  official 
assistance  and  indeed,  as  so  often  happens,  in  defiance  of  the 
wishes  of  the  management,  there  often  comes  to  the  fore  in 
union  circles  a  type  of  aggressive  individual  who  sees  in  the 
organization  an  opportunity  for  self-aggrandizement  which 
would  not  be  open  to  him  in  the  service  itself.  Individuals  of 
this  type,  however  necessary  they  may  be  in  the  development 
of  the  organization  during  its  formative  period,  are  not  neces- 
sarily or  even  generally  the  most  desirable  type  of  leader  or 
representative.  When  employee  representation  is  based  upon 
membership  in  the  organization  rather  than  merely  upon  em- 
ployment itself,  the  tendency  is,  however,  for  this  type  of 
leadership  to  persist. 

Up  to  the  present  time  the  employees'  organizations,  how- 
ever, have  furnished  the  chief  medium  of  conference  between 
employees  and  management  in  the  federal  service.  In  the 
industrial  establishments,  notably  in  the  arsenals  and  navy 
yards,  it  has  long  been  customary  for  the  management  to  recog- 
nize the  officers  of  the  several  trades  unions  to  which  the  vari- 
ous classes  of  employees  belong  as  speaking  for  the  employees. 
In  the  Navy  Department,  this  recognition  has  gone  so  far  as  to 
permit  the  officers  of  the  several  national  trade  unions  affected 
to   appear  before   the   Assistant   Secretary   of   the   Navy   to 


574  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

prosecute  appeals  from  the  wage  scales  recommended  by  the 
departmental  wage  board. 

For  many  years  after  the  formation  of  the  postal  organiza- 
tions it  was  customary  for  their  national  officers  to  confer 
with  the  departmental  officers  at  Washington,  but  this  condition 
was  permitted  by  the  departmental  officers  to  continue  only  as 
long  as  the  organization  remained  under  the  tutelage  of  the 
department,  advocating,  at  least  publicly,  no  measures  with 
which  the  department  did  not  accord.     About  19 12  the  rela- 
tions between  the  department  and  some  of  the  postal  organiza- 
tions became  strained;  and,  with  the  increasing  militancy  of 
those  organizations,  and  the  increasing  hostility  to  them  on 
the  part  of  the  Postmaster  General  and  his  assistants,  it  was 
not  many  months  before  amicable  relations  between  the  de- 
partment and  the  unions  ceased  entirely.     From  this  it  was  a 
short  step  to  the  position  taken  by  Postmaster  General  Burleson 
of  refusing  to  meet  the  representatives  of  the  unions.     Since 
about  19 1 6  the  contact  of  the  postal  organizations  with  the 
department  has  been  limited  to  the  presentation  of  grievances. 
Outside  the  postal  service,  the  organization  of  employees 
not  in  the  recognized  trades  has  developed  only  within  the 
last   few  years.     The  National  Federation  of  Federal  Em- 
ployees,  however,   has   had   remarkable   success    in    securing 
recognition    from   the   departmental   authorities   of    its    right 
to  speak  for  the  employees.     On  a  number  of  occasions  its 
national  officers  have  conferred  with  the   heads   of   services 
and  departments.     In  one  case — that  of  the  Picatinny  Arsenal 
— it  effected  an  agreement  with  the  commanding  officer  to 
treat  the  president  of  the  local  union  as  the  employees'  rep- 
resentative for  the  consideration  of  all  grievances.     Perhaps 
the  most  striking  success  of  the  Federation  in  receiving  ac- 
ceptance as  the  employees'  representative,  however,  was  that 
accorded   it   by   the    Reclassification   Commission,   which   au- 
thorized the  President  of  the  Federation  to  nominate  a  mem- 
ber of  the  organization   from  each  department  to  represent 
the  employees  on  the  central  departmental  cooperating  com- 
mittees set  up  by  the  Commission. 


APPENDIX 

TABLE  I 

Approximate  Number  of  Civil  Employees  in  the  Executive  and 
Administrative  Services  of  the  Federal  Government 

July  i,  1919^ 

The  White  House  47 

Department  of  State 
Departmental 

Secretary's  Office   7 

Office  of  Under  Secretary  of  State   23 

Assistant  Secretary's  Office 6 

Second  Assistant  Secretary's  Office   9 

Third  Assistant  Secretary's  Office 10 

Solicitor's   Office    38 

Office  of  the  Director  of  the  Consular  Service 4 

Chief  Clerk's  Office   65 

Diplomatic  Bureau    35 

Consular  Bureau  35 

Division  of  Latin-American  Affairs  6 

Division  of  Western  European  Affairs 16 

Division  of  Mexican  Affairs   7 

Division  of  Far  Eastern  Affairs 7 

Division  of  Near  Eastern  Affairs 6 

Division  of  Foreign  Intelligence  16 

Division  of  Russian  Affairs  6 

Division  of  Passport  Control  174 

Bureau  of  Appointments   10 

Bureau  of  Indexes  and  Archives 181 

Bureau  of  Accounts  20 

Bureau  of  Rolls  and  Library 11 

Translators    3 

Office  of  Foreign  Trade  Adviser 51 

Office  of  Adviser  on  Commercial  Treaties 3 

Law  Editor's  Office 2 

War  Trade  Board  Section 200 

Total :    Departmental    951 

*  OiKcial  Register  of  the  United  States,  1919. 

575 


576  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Department  of  State — Continued 
Foreign  Service 

Diplomatic  Service  (approximate)    132 

Consular  Service  (approximate)   93^ 

Total :  Foreign  Service  (approximate)   1,068 

Total :    Department  of  State  (approximate)    2,019 

Treasury  Department 
Departmental 

Secretary's   Office    33 

Division  of  Appointments   22 

Auditor  for  the  Interior  Department   89 

Auditor  for  the  Navy  Department  232 

Auditor  for  the  Post  Office  Department 551 

Auditor  for  the  State  and  Other  Departments 106 

Auditor  for  the  Treasury  Department    192 

Auditor  for  the  War  Department 966 

Division  of  Bookkeeping  and  Warrants  51 

Chief  Clerk's  Office 913 

Coast  Guard   56 

Comptroller  of  the  Currency 165 

Comptroller  of  the  Treasury 63 

Division  of  Customs   43 

Office  of  the  Commissioner  of  Internal  Revenue 4,088 

Federal  Farm  Loan  Bureau  7^ 

Division  of  Loans  and  Currency 2,204 

Bureau  of  the  Mint 13 

Public  Health  Service   61 

Register  of  the  Treasury 554 

Secret  Service  Division 10 

Office  of  the  Supervising  Architect 215 

Office  of  the  Treasurer  of  the  United  States 1,095 

Bureau  of  War  Risk  Insurance  '11,268 

Bureau  of  Engraving  and  Printing  6,779 

War  Savings  Division  102 

Disbursing  Clerk   17 

Division  of  Mails  and  Files   9 

Division  of  Printing  and  Stationery  28 

Division  of  Public  Moneys  23 

Section  of  Surety  Bonds  7 

Secretary's  Bond  Roll   284 

Total :    Departmental    30,310 

*As   returned   October    15,    1919. 


APPENDIX  577 

Treasury  Department — Continued 
Field  Service 

Customs  Service   (approximate)    6,500 

Internal  Revenue  Service   (approximate)    9.967 

Public  Health  Service   (approximate)    2,500 

Coast  Guard  Service  (approximate)    5,023 

Subtreasury  Service   320 

Custodian-Janitor  Service   (approximate)  5,500 

Public  Building  Service   (approximate)    120 

Mint  and  Assay  Service  (approximate)    700 

National  Bank  Examiners,  Receivers,  Attorneys,  etc.,  (ap- 
proximate)       700 

Total :    Field  Service  3i>330 

Total:    Treasury  Department   (approximate)    61,640 

Department  of  Justice 

Office  of  the   Attorney   General    (including  Bureau  of 

Investigation)      1,020 

Special   assistant  attorneys    200 

Offices  of  United   States   attorneys    510 

Office  of  United  States  marshals  800 

Customs    Division    20 

National  Training  School  for  Boys   62 

Penitentiaries    310 

United  States  court  officials  and  employees  (including 
about  200  justices,  judges,  officials,  and  employees  of 
courts  in  the  District  of  Columbia,  connected  with  or 
under  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Department  of  Justice) 

(approximate)     2,800 


Total:   Department  of  Justice    (approximate)    ....  5,722 

War   Department 
Departmental 

Office  of  the  Secretary  of  War 397 

Office  of  the  Chief  of  Stafif  (including  War  College)   ..  444 

The  Adjutant  General's  Office  4,532 

Office  of  the  Chief  of  Coast  Artillery  30 

Militia  Bureau   37 

Office  of  the   Inspector  General    34 

Office  of  the  Judge  Advocate  General 125 

Office  of  the  Quartermaster  General,   Director  of  Pur- 
chase  and    Storage    1,918 

Construction  Division  1, 197 

Office  of  the  Chief  of  the  Motor  Transport  Corps 442 

Office  of  the  Surgeon  General 603 


578  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

War  Department — Continued 
Departmental — Continued 

Office  of  the  Chief  of  Engineers 192 

Office  of  the  Chief  of  Ordnance i)537 

Office  of  the  Chief  Signal  Officer 209 

Office  of  the  Director  of  Air  Service ^    i,474 

Bureau  of  Insular  Affairs  63 

Office  of  the  Director  of  the  Chemical  Warfare  Service  150 

War  Credits  Board  3 

Total:    Departmental    13,387 

Field  Service 

Purchase,  Storage,  and  Traffic  Service  59,7o6 

Transportation    Service    361 

Finance  Service   2,1 10 

Real  Estate  Service  112 

Medical    Department 3>69i 

Engineer  Department  24,030 

Ordnance  Department 44,964 

Signal   Service    841 

Air    Service    7,223 

Motor  Transport  Corps   17,461 

Chemical  Warfare  Service   926 

Construction  Division  19,670 

Tank  Corps  4 

Military  Headquarters    68 

Board  of  Ordnance  and  Fortification i 

United  States  Military  Academy   183 

National  Military  Park  Commissions    166 

Alaska  Road  Commission   349 

Lincoln  Farm  Commission    3 

Total :  Field  Service   181,869 


Total:  War  Department  (as  of  August  i,  1919)  . .   195,256 


Navy  Department 
Departmental 

Office  of  the  Secretary 106 

Office  of  the  Solicitor  16 

Office  of  Naval  Records  and  Library  17 

Office  of  Judge  Advocate  General  22 

Office  of  Naval  Intelligence   18 

Hydrographic  Office    142 

Naval   Observatory    46 

Nautical  Almanac  Office 15 


APPENDIX  579 

Navy  Department — Continued 
Departmental — Continued 

Bureau  of  Navigation 145 

Bureau  of  Steam  Engineering  214 

Bureau  of  Construction  and  Repair 322 

Bureau  of  Ordnance  84 

Bureau  of  Supplies  and  Accounts 448 

Bureau  of  Medicine  and  Surgery  34 

Bureau  of  Yards  and  Docks  257 

Office  of  Chief  of  Naval  Operations  71 

Office  of  General  Board 7 

Office  of  Board  of  Inspection  and  Survey 15 

Office  of  Compensation  Board  13 

Office  of  Naval  Examining  Board 4 

Office  of  Naval  Consulting  Board i 

Navy  Allotment  Office   29 

Navy  Disbursing  Office 117 

Office  of  Director  of  Naval  Communications  23 

Total :  Departmental   2,166 

Field  Service 

Navy  yards  and  shore  stations   (approximate)    105,622 

Total :  Navy  Department  (approximate)    107,788 

Post  Office  Department 

Office  of  the  Postmaster  General 

Department    1)336 

Post  office   inspectors    422 

Clerks  at  headquarters,  Division  of  Post  Office  Inspectors  100 

Total :  Office  of  the  Postmaster  General   1,858 

Office  of  the  First  Assistant  Postmaster  General 

Department    12 

Postmasters : 

First-class     665 

Second-class     2,539 

Third-class  7,621 

Fourth-class     42,259 

Assistant  Postmasters   2,648 

Clerks 

First  and  second  class  offices    44,681 

Third-class   offices    (estimated)    13,000 

Fourth-class  offices  (estimated)    42,259 


58o  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Post  Office  Department — Continued 

OfRce  of  the  First  Assistant  Postmaster  General — Continued 

In  charge  of  contract  stations   5, 170 

City  letter  carriers   35,024 

Watchmen,  messengers,  laborers,  printers,  etc i,93i 

Screen-wagon  contractors    261 

Mail  messengers   8,589 

Motor-vehicle   employees    1,809 

Total :  Office  of  thf  First  Assistant  Postmaster  Gen- 
eral      208,468 

Office  of  the  Second  Assistant  Postmaster  General 

Department    114 

Railway  Mail  Service : 

Officers :    142 

Railway  postal  clerks   17,916 

Substitute  railway  postal  clerks  2,770 

Steamboat  contractors  262 

Air  mail  employees 164 

Star  route  contractors  in  Alaska   40 

Total :    Office   of   the    Second   Assistant   Postmaster 

General     21,408 

Office  of  the  Third  Assistant  Postmaster  General 

Department    15 

Stamped-envelope   agency    1 1 

Total:    Office    of    the    Third    Assistant    Postmaster 

General     26 

Office  of  the  Fourth  Assistant  Postmaster  General 

Department    7 

Equipment   shops    274 

Shipment  of  supplies  17 

Rural  carriers   43»m 

Village  carriers    845 

Motor-truck  drivers  and  mechanics 50 

Traveling  mechanicians    3 

Star  route  contractors    10,773 

Total:   Office   of   the    Fourth    Assistant   Postmaster 

General     55,o8o 

Total :   Post  Office  Department   286,840 


APPENDIX                       '  581 

Department  of  the  Interior 

Office  of  the  Secretary  577 

Office  of  the  SoHcitor  45 

General  Land  Office  and  Land  Service 1,381 

Office  of  Indian  Affairs  and  Indian  Service    (approxi- 
mate)       5,835 

Pension  Office  904 

Patent  Office   951 

Bureau  of  Education  and  Alaska  Service 274 

Geological  Survey   930 

Reclamation  Service    3,305 

Bureau  of  Mines   774 

Office  of  Superintendent  of  Capitol  Building  and  Grounds  306 

Alaskan  Engineering  Commission   (approximate)    2,064 

National  Park  Service,  and  Parks  and  Reservations  ....  247 

St.    Elizabeth's    Hospital    726 

Freedmen's  Hospital   ill 

Howard  University   65 

Columbia  Institution   for  the   Deaf    67 

Office  of  Recorder  of  Deeds   42 

Office  of  Register  of  Wills   34 

Territorial — Alaska    (19)    and   Hawaii    (3)    22 

Total :  Department  of  the  Interior  18,660 


Department  of  Agriculture 

Office  of  the  Secretary  474 

Office  of  Farm  Management  148 

Weather  Bureau    952 

Bureau  of  Animal  Industry 4,763 

Bureau  of  Plant  Industry  i,735 

Forest   Service    2,835 

Bureau  of  Chemistry   683 

Bureau  of  Soils  164 

Bureau  of  Entomology  425 

Bureau  of  Biological  Survey 160 

Division  of  Publications  178 

Bureau  of  Crop  Estimates 214 

States  Relations  Service   420 

Library     34 

Bureau  of  Public  Roads    613 

Division  of  Accounts  and  Disbursements   36 

Insecticide  and  Fungicide  Board  55 

Federal   Horticultural   Board    122 

Bureau  of  Markets   1,567 

Temporary  Employees   407 


582  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Department  of  Agriculture — Continued 

Miscellaneous       (Includes       collaborators,       cooperative 

agents,  special  meteorological  observers,  etc.)    6,987 

Total :  Department  of  Agriculture  22,972 

Department  of  Commerce 

Office  of  the  Secretary  183 

Bureau  of  the  Census  1,348 

Bureau  of  Foreign  and  Domestic  Commerce 305 

Bureau  of  Standards    996 

Bureau  of  Fisheries 428 

Bureau  of  Lighthouses    5,8 18 

Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey  942 

Bureau  of  Navigation   204 

Steamboat-Inspection  Service   408 

Total :  Department  of  Commerce  10,632 

Department  of  Labor 

Office  of  the  Secretary  113 

Bureau  of  Labor  Statistics 214 

Bureau  of  Immigration   65 

Immigration  Service  at  large   1,326 

Division  of  Information    6 

Contract  Labor  44 

Children's  Bureau   81 

Children's   Bureau   at  large    126 

Bureau   of   Naturalization    75 

Naturalization  Service  at  large   156 

United  States  Employment  Service  186 

United  States  Employment  Service  at  large   1,269 

Women  in  Industry    14 

Total :  Department  of  Labor   3,675 

Interstate  Commerce  Commission 

Offices  of  the  Commissioners 28 

Office  of  the  Secretary  22 

Car  Service  2 

Carriers'  Accounts  86 

Office  of  the  Chief  Examiner 54 

Correspondence    and    Claims    27 

Disbursements  and  Accounts  18 

Dockets     23 

Documents    6 

Fifteenth  Section  Board   20 


APPENDIX  583 

Interstate  Commerce  Commission — Continued 

Fourth  Section  Board  4 

Indices     6 

Inquiry    19 

Law   6 

Library    3 

Locomotive   Inspection    76 

Mails  and  Files 44 

Printing  Section  2 

Safety    75 

Statistics   85 

Stenography    40 

Supplies    .        70 

Tariffs     118 

Valuation    1,380 

Total :  Interstate  Commerce  Commission   2,214 

Civil  Service  Commission 

Office  of  the  Commission    1 1 

Chief  Examiner's  Office  3 

Application  Division   54 

Appointment   Division    96 

Examining   Division    68 

Custodian   Service 25 

Field  Force   49 

Total :  Civil   Service  Commission   306 

Federal  Reserve  Board 

Office  of  members  of  board  9 

Office  of  the  Secretary  31 

Office  of  Counsel   9 

Division  of  Audit  and  Examination  26 

Division  of  Statistics    32 

Division  of  Analysis  and  Research  10 

Division   of   Architecture    I 

Division  of   Issue    49 

Total :  Federal  Reserve  Board  167 

Federal  Trade  Commission 

Office    of    Commissioners    9 

Administrative  Department   loi 

Economic   Department    162 

Legal   Department   63 

Total :  Federal  Trade  Commission   335 


584  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

United   States   Shipping   Board    (including   Emergency   Fleet 
Corporation) 

Office  of  the  Shipping  Board   933 

Emergency  Fleet  Corporation ^  6,458 

Division  of   Operations    i>732 

Division  of  the  Comptroller   1,948 

Total:   United   States   Shipping   Board    (including 
Emergency  Fleet  Corporation) 11,071 

The  Panama  Canal 

Washingfton  Office   107 

United  States,  outside  District  of  Columbia   31 


In  the  Canal  Zone   (estimated)  : 

Silver        Gold 
Department  Force        Force 

Operation  and  maintenance  8,880         1,720  10,600 

Supply    4,443           382  4,825 

Accounting     14            193  207 

Health     1,038           204  1,242 

Executive   198           384  582 

Total    14,573        2,883  17,456 

Total :  The  Panama  Canal  17,594 

Government  Printing  Office 

Office  of  the  Public  Printer  I 

Office  of  the  Deputy  Public  Printer  3 

Office  of  the  Chief  Clerk  27 

Office  of  the  Purchasing  Agent 17 

Office  of  the  Accountant 54 

Computing    Division    33 

Emergency  Hospital  Section  3 

Office  of  the  Superintendent  of  Documents 213 

Office  of  the  Superintendent  of  Work 49 

Office  of  the  Foreman  of  Printing 14 

Delivery   Section    41 

White   House   detail    6 

Proof  Section   304 

Linotype   Section    338 

Monotype   Section    500 

Hand   Section    222 

Job  Section   116 

a  Includes  only  employees  of  administrative  and  executive  divisions, 
and  excludes  mechanics  and  other  employees  of  the  various  shipyards. 


/ 

APPENDIX                        '  585 

Government  Printing  Ofllce — Continued 

Money-order    Section    16 

Foundry  Section  118 

Plate-vault    Section    16 

Library  of  Congress  Branch  Printing  Section  25 

Press    Division    626 

Postal-card   Section    36 

Office  of  Foreman  of  Building  25 

Forwarding  and  Finishing  Section  401 

Pamphlet-binding    Section    659 

Ruling  and  Sewing  Section   293 

Library  of  Congress  Branch  Binding  Section 73 

Office  of  Superintendent  of  Building  35 

Watch-force   Section   67 

Engineer's    Section    63 

Electrical    Section    79 

Machine-shop  Section   35 

Carpenter  and  Paint  Shop  Section 25 

Sanitary    Section    77 

Stores    Division    136 

Congressional  Record   7 

Metal   Section    11 

Legislative  detail   9 

Total :  Government  Printing  Office  4)773 

Smithsonian  Institution 

National   Museum    327 

International    Exchanges    16 

Bureau  of  American  Ethnology    17 

National  Zoological   Park    59 

Astrophysical    Observatory    8 

International  Catalogue  of  Scientific  Literature 6 

Total :  Smithsonian  Institution    433 

Alien  Property  Custodian 

Office  of  Alien  Property  Custodian   3 

Office  of  Managing  Director 2 

Bureau  of  Administration  99 

Bureau  of  Investigation  15 

Bureau  of  Trusts  121 

Bureau  of  Law 43 

Bureau  of  Sales  45 

Total :  Alien  Property  Custodian 328 


586  THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 

Other  Independent  Establishments,  Boards,  Commissions,  etc. 

Bureau   of    Efficiency    24 

United  States  Tariff  Commission 54 

Employees'  Compensation  Commission   49 

Federal  Board  for  Vocational  Education 2,441 

Council   of   National   Defense    91 

Office   of   the    Superintendent   of   the    State,   War,   and 

Navy  Building   1,806 

Miscellaneous  boards,  commissions,  etc.  (Board  of 
Mediation  and  Conciliation,  International  (Canadian) 
Boundary  Commission,  International  High  Commission 
— United  States  Section,  International  Joint  Commis- 
sion of  the  United  States  and  Canada,  Commission  of 
Fine  Arts,  Arlington  Memorial  Amphitheater  Commis- 
sion, Lincoln  Memorial  Commission,  Commission  on 
Memorial   to  Women   of  the   Civil   War,   and   United 

States  Botanic  Garden)    ^158 

Total :   Other   Independent   Establishments,   Boards, 

Commissions,  etc 4,623 

Grand  Total :   Executive   and  Administrative   Serv- 
ices  (approximate)    757,095 

*  Does  not  include  officers  and  members  who  serve  without  compensa- 
tion. 

TABLE  II 
Extent  of  the  Classified  Service  in  Greater  New  York  ^ 


Service 

Supervi- 
sory, tech- 
nical 
and  cler- 
ical 

Sub- 
clerical 

Trades 

Total 

Assay  Office 

32 

50 

151 

2 

2 

3 
I 
2 

12 

7 

I 

14 
5 
13 
23 
13 
9 

42 

7 
17 
19 

6 
II 

86 

Board  of  General  Appraisers    . . . 

Bureau  of  Animal  Industry   

Custodian  Service : 

Custom  house  building 

Barge  office   

57 
152 

49 
12 

Appraisers  stores    

32 

45 
20 
22 

Courthouse  and  post  office    . . 
New  post  office  building   .... 
Brooklyn  post  office    

Total :   Custodian  Service    . 

10           yy 

93 

180 

■Thirtieth   Report   of   the   United    States    Civil    Service    Commission 
(1913).  p.  173. 


APPENDIX 


587 


Extent  of  the  Classified  Service  in  Greater 
New  York — Continued 


Customs  Service : 

Collector's  office   

1,164 
438 
154 
105 

390 
321 

15 
10 

5 
5 

1,559 
764 
169 
IIS 

Appraiser's     

Naval   Office      

Surveyor's  Office   

Total :  Customs  Service   . . . 

1,861 

736 

ID 

33 

12 
20 

2,607 

Depot  Quartermaster,  United  States 
Army       

87 

25 

46 
45 
39 

68 

5 

7 
4 

I 

188 

United     States     attorney's     office, 
southern  district,  New  York  .... 
United  States  Engineer's  Office: 
First  district    

30 

65 
69 
40 

Second  district 

Third  district   

Total:   United  States   Engi- 
neer's Office 

130 

12 

32 

174 

Headquarters,      Eastern      Depart- 
ment, United  States  Army   .... 
Immigration  Service   

26 

249 

4 

2 
6 
7 

127 
I 

26 
7 

60 

26 

436 

5 

2 

Indian  warehouse 

Internal  Revenue  Service : 

First  district 

32 
14 

Third  district    

Total :      Internal      Revenue 
Service    

15 

33 



48 

Lighthouse    Service,    third   district 
Medical  Supply  Depot   

Z7 
12 

449 

10 

11,021 

II 

48 
3 

351 

14 

34 

88 

6 

10 

II 

13 
86 

7 

152 

II 

2 

27 
2 

213 

3,334 
26 
10 

17 
13 

261 

25 
3,869 

43 
11,031 

163 

76 
3 

351 
16 

Navy  Yard 

New  York  Arsenal   

Post  Office  Service    

Public  Health  Service 

Quartermaster,     United      States 
Army,   Eastern  Department    . . . 

Radio  Service,  Inspector's  Office  . 

Railway  Mail  Service,  Second  Di- 
vision     

Signal  Office,  United  States  Army, 
Eastern  Department    

Steamboat  Inspection  Service  .... 

United  States  Subtreasury   

Superintendent  of  Public  Buildings 
United  States  Weather  Bureau   . . 

34 

"5 

19 

12 

Grand  Total    

14,734 

1,390 

3,883 

20,007 

588 


THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 
TABLE  III 


Civil  Employees  in  the  District  of  Columbia  Working  Full 
Time  and  Receiving  No  Allowance,  April  30,  1919* 


Service  and  Class  (where  number  in 
class  is  100  or  more) 

■75 
0 
H 

B 

All  Services 

78,133 

29,409 

48,628 

96 

Services  involving  Clerical,  Office,  or 
Commercial  Work 

54,115 

14,610 

39,431 

74 

I.  Total  for  Classes  having  100  or 
more  in  the  Administrative 
and    Supervisory    Clerical 
Service  

371 
221 

150 
383 

349 

21 
16 

5 
268 

I 

Head  Clerk  (Group)   

Junior      Clerical      Adminis- 
trator  (Group)    

2.  Total  for  Classes  having  100  or 
more    in    the    Department 
Publications  and  Informa- 
tion Service  

205 
144 

"5 

38 

21 

56 

3,149 

I 

Editorial  Assistant   

Junior     Information     Clerk 

(Group)    

Information  Aid   

3.  Total  for  Classes  having  100  or 
more    in    the    Fiscal    and 
Accounting  Service    

105 

104 
174 

6,042 

67 

83 
118 

2,889 

4 

Senior  Accountant   

Under  Accounting  Clerk  . . . 

Junior  Accounting  Clerk  . . . 

Senior  Accounting  Clerk  . . . 

Principal  Accounting  Clerk. 

Junior  Audit  Clerk    

Senior  Audit  Clerk   

Income  Tax  Audit  Clerk  . . . 

Junior  Income  Tax  Account- 
ant     

Associate    Income    Tax   Ac- 
countant   

128 

1,361 
2,130 

647 
231 
482 

243 
188 

267 
365 

128 
302 
817 

509 
216 
284 
192 
109 

257 
335 

1,056 

1,312 

138 

15 
198 

51 
79 

10 
30 

3 

I 

*  From  unpublished  data  in  the  files  of  the  Reclassification  Commission. 


APPENDIX 


589 


Civil   Employees   in   the  District  of  Columbia  Working  Full 
Time  and  Receiving  No  Allowance,  April  30,  1919 — Continued 


4.  Total  for  Classes  having  100  or 
more  in  the  Mail,  File,  and 
Record  Service   

Junior  Recorder   

Senior  Recorder   

Principal  Recorder 

Under  File  Clerk 

Junior  File  and  Record  Clerk 
Senior     File     and     Record 

Clerk    (Group)    

Principal    File    and    Record 

Clerk  (Group) 

Head  File  and  Record  Clerk 

(Group)    

Junior  Mail  Routing  Clerk  . 
Senior  Mail  Routing  Clerk  . 
Principal  Mail  Routing  Clerk 

(Group)    

Junior      Mail      Despatching 

Clerk    

Senior      Mail      Despatching 

Clerk    

5.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 

more     in    the     Messenger 
Service    

Junior  Messenger  

Senior  Messenger 

Principal  Messenger 

6.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 

more  in  the  Miscellaneous 
Clerical  Service 

Under  Clerk  

Junior  Clerk    

Senior  Clerk 

Principal  Clerk  (Group)    . . 

Under  Counter   

Senior  Counter   

Principal  Counter 

Junior  Verifier 

Senior  Verifier   


17.742 


157 

1,113 

106 

441 
10,841 

2,741 
522 

100 

485 
682 

138 

202 

214 

3.392 


1,136 

1.951 
305 


5.546 


594 
1,406 

713 
158 

383 
662 

155 
894 
581 


3.519 


20 

207 

66 

186 

1,674 

600 
273 

85 
115 
126 

60 

51 

56 


2,873 


856 

1,721 

296 


1,120 


112 
321 
390 
143 

15 
10 

77 
52 


14,200 


137 

904 

40 

253 

9,155 

2,137 
248 

14 
369 
556 

78 

151 

158 


503 


274 
222 

7 


4,418 


482 
1,081 
322 
15 
383 
647 
144 

815 
529 


23 


2 
12 

4 
I 

I 
I 


16 


590 


THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 


Civil  Employees  in   the  District  of  Columbia  Working  Full 
Time  and  Receiving  No  Allowance,  April  30,  1919 — Continued 


7.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 
more  in  the  Office  Appli- 
ance Operating  Service   . 

1,572 

290 

1,278 

4 

Address  Plate  Cutter  

Address  Plate  Verifier   .... 

Address  Plate  File  Clerk  . . 

Principal    Address    Machine 
Clerk    

Mimeograph  Operator 

Multigraph  Operator  

Adding  Machine  Operator  . 

Calculating    Machine    Oper- 
ator      

235 
135 
232 

170 
116 
122 
247 

315 

256 

156 
260 
279 

154 

8 

2 

16 

54 
93 
78 
30 

9 

195 
56 

72 

22 

45 

131 

226 

133 
216 

116 
21 

44 
217 

305 

756 
200 

84 

238 

234 

23 

I 

2 
I 

8.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 
more     in     the     Personnel 
Service    

Junior  Personnel  Clerk  .... 
Senior       Personnel       Clerk 

(Group)    

Under   Time   and   Pay    Roll 

Clerk    

Junior   Time   and   Pay    Roll 

Clerk    

9.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 

more    in    the    Specialized 

Business  Service 

Senior   Transportation   Rate 

Clerk    

10.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 
more    in   the    Supply    and 
Equipment  Service 

154 
2,171 

131 
994 

23 
1,177 

Junior     Property     Accounts 
Examiner    

290 
121 
169 
612 
169 

57 

35 

81 

127 

119 

233 
86 
88 

485 
50 

Junior      Purchasing      Office 
Clerk    

Junior      Publications      Dis- 
tributor     

Junior    Stores    Clerk    (Mili- 
tary and  Naval)    

Senior   Stores   Clerk    (Mili- 
tary and  Naval)   

APPENDIX 


591 


Civil  Employees  in   the  District  of  Columbia   Working   Full 
Time  and  Receiving  No  Allowance,  April  30,  1919 — Continued 


Under  Supplies  Clerk 
Junior  Supplies  Clerk  . 
Senior  Supplies  Clerk 


II. 


12. 


Total  for  classes  having  100  or 
more  in  the  Telephone  and 
Telegraph  Operating  Serv- 
ice   

Junior  Telephone  Operator  . 

Total  for  classes  having  100  or 
more  in  the  Typing, 
Stenographic,  Correspond- 
ence and  Secretarial  Serv- 


ice 


Junior  Correspondence  Clerk 
Senior  Correspondence  Clerk 

(Group)    

Stenographer  Secretary  .... 
Junior  Stenographer   ...... 

Senior  Stenographer   

Principal  Stenographer  .... 
Junior  Stenographer-clerk  . 
Senior  Stenographer-clerk   . 

Under  Typist 

Junior  Typist 

Senior  Typist    

Under  Typist-clerk 

Junior  Typist-clerk 

Services  Involving  the  Skilled  Trades, 
Manual  Labor,  Public 
Safety,  or  Related  Work  . 

I.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 
more  in  the  Custodial  and 
Janitor  Service   


Guard 

Cleaners    

Charw^oman    . . 
School  Janitor 


2.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 
more     in     the     Domestic 

Service    

Rag  Washer  


125 

113 

481 

292 

204 

170 

213 

12 

213 

12 

15,578 

1,863 

1,563 

331 

315 

227 

279 

61 

3,639 

202 

737 

91 

236 

71 

2,282 

210 

1,155 

196 

3,256 

252 

733 

77 

200 

22 

800 

79 

383 

44 

15,860 

11,215 

3,376 
1,585 

2,759 

1,585 

1,079 

1,061 

578 

— 

134 

113 

113 

"3 

"3 

113 

12 

189 

34 


200 


200 


13,698 
1,231 

87 
217 

3,429 
646 

165 
2,072 

958 
3,000 
656 
178 
720 
339 


4,635 


613 


14 

578 

21 


17 
I 

I 
I 
8 


10 


592 


THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 


Civil   Employees   in   the   District  of  Columbia  Working   Full 
Time  and  Receiving  No  Allowance,  April  30,  1919 — Continued 


3,  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 
more  in  the  Farm,  Garden, 
and  Park  Maintenance 
Service    


Park  Laborer 


4.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 
more  in  the  Fire  Service  . 


Subprivate 

ment)   

Senior    Private 

partment)    . . 


(Fire     Depart- 
(Fire    De- 


5.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 

more  in  the  Police  and 
Criminal  Investigation 
Service    

Subprivate  (Police  Depart- 
ment)    

Senior  Private  (Police  De- 
partment)     

6.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 

more  in  the  Printing 
Trades  Service 

Bindery  Worker  

Bookbinder  

Plate  Printers'  Assistant  . . . 

Steel  and  Copper  Plate 
Printers   

Press  Feeder   

Flatbed  Pressman 

Compositor   

Maker-up    

Linotype  Operator   

Monotype  Keyboard  Oper- 
ator      

Proofreader    

Helper— G.P.O 

Machine  Operator  (Light)  . 

Hydraulic  and  Plater  Press 
Packer  

Money  and  Tissue  Separator 

Paper  Security  Examiner  . 


135 


135 

455 

224 
231 

522 

104 
418 

6,342 


430 
386 

1,233 

907 
291 

247 
366 

125 
144 

119 

238 
131 

542 

133 
23  s 
815 


135 


135 
455 


224 
231 

522 

104 
418 

2,626 


3 
386 

3 

907 
I 

247 
353 
125 
140 

106 
220 
131 


3,713 


427 
1,227 

290 

13 
4 

13 

18 

540 

132 

235 
814 


APPENDIX 


593 


Civil   Employees  in   the  District  of  Columbia   Working   Full 
Time  and  Receiving  No  Allowance,  April  30,  igig— Continued 


Total  for  classes  having  100  or 
more  in  the  Skilled  Trades 
and  Labor  Service   


Chauffeur    

General  Carpenter   

Electrician    •• 

Elevator  Operator   

Laborer   

Freight  Handler  

Mail  Bag  Sewer  

Mailer  and  Wrapper 

Helper  Mechanical  Trades 

Packer  

Teamster  

Shop  Porter 

Laboratory  Helper  


Services  Involving  Scientific,  Tech- 
nical, Professional,  or 
Subsidiary  Work 

I.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 
more  in  the  Arts  Service  . 


Photographic 
Aid   


Laboratory 


2.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 

more    in    the    Educational 
Service    

Kindergartner    

Teacher,  Elementary  Schools 

Special  Teacher,  Elemen- 
tary School  (Group)   .... 

Teaching  Principal,  Ele- 
mentary Schools   

Teacher,  High  School 
(Group)    

3.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 

more    in   the    Engineering 
Service    

Junior  Civil  Engineer 

Mechanical  Engineering 

Draftsman    

Junior  Mechanical  Engineer 


594 


THE  FEDERAL  SERVICE 


Civil   Employees  in   the  District  of  Columbia  Working  Full 
Time  and  Receiving  No  Allowance,  April  30,  1919 — Continued 


Assistant  Mechanical  Engi- 
neer     

4.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 

more  in  the  Law  and  Ex- 
aminer Service   

Junior  Attorney    

Assistant  Attorney   (Group) 

Attorney    (Group)    

Senior  Attorney  (Group)   . . 

Under  Examiner 

Junior  Examiner  (Group)  . 
Senior  Examiner  (Group)  . 
Principal  Examiner  (Group) 

5.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 

more  in  the  Library  Serv- 
ice      

Junior  Library  Assistant  . . 
Library  Assistant   

6.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 

more  in  the  Physical  Sci- 
ence Service 

Junior  Chemist   

Associate  Chemist 

7.  Total  for  classes  having  100  or 

more     in     the     Statistical 
Service    

Card  Punch  Operator   

Mechanical  Tabulation  Coder 

Special  Mechanical  Tabula- 
tion Coder  

Junior  Statistical  Clerk  .... 

Senior  Statistical  Clerk 
(Group)    

Principal  Statistical  Clerk 
(Group)    


142 

142 

2,604 

1,800 

801 

117 

113 

4 

278 

263 

15 

216 

214 

2 

177 

177 

627 

108 

518 

559 

402 

156 

442 

342 

99 

188 

181 

7 

305 

70 
38 

234 

194 

155 

III 

32 

79 

225 

200 

24 

lOI 

78 

22 

124 

122 

2 

2,638 

772 

1,866 

301 

20 

281 

152 

13 

139 

104 

I 

103 

929 

169 

760 

755 

287 

468 

397 

282 

115 

INDEX 


Absence,  leaves  of,  521-525;  laws 
providing,  522;  Reclassifica- 
tion Commission  recommenda- 
tions, 524;  ruling  of  Comp- 
troller of  Treasury,  522;  sick 
leave,  523. 

Accounting  positions,  promotions 
in,  251-252. 

Administration  of  personnel,  147- 
148;  and  classification,  207. 

Administrative     discretion,     322- 

323- 
Administrative  review,  502. 
Advancement,  opportunity  for,  in 

the  public  service,  511-517. 
Advisory  Council  of  Civil  Service 

recommended,  564-565. 
Age  limits  for  recruitment,  353- 

355- 

Allocation  of  positions,  206. 

Ambassadors  and  other  public 
ministers,  139-142;  and  the 
permanent    personnel,    141-142. 

American  Federation  of  Labor, 
166,  546,  550,  556;  on  the  re- 
striction of  political  activities 
of  federal  employees,   166. 

American  Political  Science  Asso- 
ciation, on  education  for  the 
civil  service,  351. 

Annual  leave,  521-525. 

Appeals  for  re-rating  of  candi- 
dates, 406. 

Appointing  power,  28-32, 

Appointment  and  promotion  in 
the  civil  service,  Attorney-Gen- 
eral on,  108-109;  probationary, 
444-446;  rule  for,  444. 

Appointment  in  selection  of  civil 
service  employees,  293-294, 
381. 

Appointments,  presidential,    102. 

Apportioned  positions,  certifica- 
tion of,  413-428;  Attorney- 
General  on,  421 ;  Civil  Service 


Commission  on,  421-424,  427; 
inefficiency  of,  415,  425-428; 
positions  waived  from  appoint- 
ment, 414;  procedure  in,  416- 
421;  rules  providing,  413-414; 
Secretary  of  Commerce  and 
Labor  on,  426. 

Appraisal  of  positions,  206. 

Appropriation  technique  and 
classification,  208-213. 

Appropriations  for  salaries,  185- 
193;  lump  sum,  185-193. 

Arrangement  of  classes,  202-203. 

Area  of  selection  of  personnel 
within  the  service,  264-292. 

Assembled  examinations,  358- 
361. 

Assistant  secretaries  and  analo- 
gous officers,  98-99;  and  pro- 
motion within  the  service,  99. 

Attorney-General  on  appoint- 
ment and  promotion  in  the  civil 
service,  108-109. 

Auditors  of  the  Departments, 
III. 


Bank    examiner,    chief    national, 

132-133- 
Blind   alleys    in   promotion,   246; 

causes  of,  246-248. 
Boards     and     commissions,     116- 

117;     employees    of,     116-117; 

local  boards,  386. 
Bonaparte,    Charles    J.,    on    the 

merit  system  as  applied  in  the 

Department    of    Justice,     115- 

116. 
British  Civil  Service,  conference 

machinery  in,  566-567. 
British  Civil  Service  system  and 

the   American   conditions,   255- 

258. 
British    personnel    system,     254- 

255 ;  and  American  conditions, 


595 


596 


INDEX 


255-258;    and    the    universities. 

255- 

Bryan,  William  Jennings,  on 
tenure  in  office,  87. 

Budget,  bureau  of.  and  classifi- 
cation, 207,  212-213. 


Campaign  contribution,  prohibi- 
tion of  forced,  155-158;  inves- 
tigation of,  by  the  Civil  Serv- 
ice   Commission,    156-158. 

Central  personnel  administration. 
538-543;  dual  character  of, 
538;  recruitment  and  regula- 
tion, 538-543- 

Certification,  administration  of, 
435-439;  apportioned  positions, 
413-428;  labors,  method  for, 
467;  local  commissioners,  rule 
of,  433;  objections  to  a  candi- 
date, 430;  objections  to  certifi- 
catnon,  432;  politics  and,  432, 
434 ;  Postmaster-General  on, 
434-435;  results  of,  435-440 ; 
restriction  of,  428-429;  rural 
carriers  and,  432;  theory  of, 
432 ;    "three    name"    rule,    429- 

440- 
Chief     Examiner     of     the     Civil 

Service  Commission,  111-113. 
Civil  Service,  activities  in  pro- 
motion, 239-246;  administration 
of  personnel  in,  147-148;  ad- 
vancement, opportunity  for, 
511-517;  advisory  council  rec- 
ommended, 564-566;  area  of 
selection  from,  attitude  of  the 
Civil  Service  Commission  on, 
271-274;  appointing  power,  28- 
32;  appointment  and  promotion 
in,  108-109;  Attorney-General 
on  appointment,  108-109;  at- 
tractions of,  508-510;  boards, 
local,  386;  campaign  contribu- 
tions, 156-158;  classification  of 
positions  in,  6-17;  control  of, 
176-177;  distribution,  depart- 
mental, 4;  distribution,  geo- 
graphical, 4-6;  distribution,  nu- 
merical, 8-1 1  ;  distribution  ac- 
cording to  status,  82-84;  em- 
ployments in,  character   of,  6- 


18;  examiner  of,  chief,  iii- 
113;  examinations  for,  27- 
29;  examinations,  exceptions 
from,  60-73 ;  includes  whom, 
1-2;  investigation  of  forced 
campaign  contributions  and  em- 
ployees, 1 56- 1 58;  laborers  in, 
73-74;  local  boards  of,  386; 
machinery  needed  for  adminis- 
tration, 147-148;  MacVeagh, 
Franklin,  on,  19;  merit  basis, 
5 10-51 1 ;  opportunity  for  ad- 
vancement, 51 1-5 17;  political 
influence  in,  20-25;  political  ac- 
tivity in,  162-164;  Postal  Serv- 
ice, 231;  prestige  of,  509;  pro- 
motion within  the  service,  22,()- 
246;  recommendation  of  ad- 
visory council,  564-566;  rules 
and  orders,  54-56,  60-64; 
selection  for,  26-54 ;  security 
of,  510;  size  of,  2-6;  women  in, 
17-18;  see  also  "Personnel  Ad- 
ministration." 

Civil  Service  Commission,  atti- 
tude toward  area  of  selection 
from  within  the  service,  271- 
274 ;  investigation  of  forced 
campaign  contributions  of  em- 
ployees,  156-158. 

Civil  service  reform,  26. 

Civilians,  in  the  War  Depart- 
ment, 234-235. 

Class  positions,  defined,  200;  al- 
location and  appraisal  of, 
206;  classification  of,  200-203; 
series  of,  202-203 ;  series  de- 
fined, 202;  services  defined,  202. 

Classification,  administration  and, 
current,  207;  appropriation 
technique  and,  208-213;  ar- 
rangement of  classes,  202-203; 
budget  and,  207,  212-213;  class 
defined,  200;  conditions  of,  188- 
190;  determination  adminis- 
trative, 185-193;  determination, 
legislative,  181-185;  imperfec- 
tions of,  192;  installation  of, 
206-207;  need  of,  180-181;  po- 
sitions and  salaries,  180-214; 
series,  202-203 ;  services,  202- 
203;  summary  of,  general,  213- 
214;  unit  of,  200-203. 


INDEX 


597 


Classified  service,  56-57;  com- 
petitive, 56-57;  definition  of, 
56-57;  definition  of  Attorney- 
General,  497;  MacVeagh, 
Franklin,  on,  19;  non-competi- 
tive positions,  57-60;  recruit- 
ment methods,  378-454.  See 
also  unclassified  service. 

Clerical  positions,  competitive  ex- 
aminations for  promotion  in, 
249-250;  sub-clerical  promo- 
tions, 249-250. 

Clerks,    confidential,    1 17-120. 

Cleveland,  President,  on  sub-cler- 
ical promotions,  249. 

Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey,  227- 
228;  promotion  within,  227-228; 
recruitment  of,  464-465. 

Coast  Guard,  civilian  and  naval 
status,  3. 

Columbia  University,  courses  for 
public  service,  351. 

Committees,  employees',  561-562; 
composition  of,  569;  function, 
570. 

Compensation  rates,  193-195;  de- 
termination of,  legal,  205-206; 
determination,  method  of,  203- 
205 ;  maximum  and  minimum, 
205. 

Compensation      standards,      172- 

Competition,  area  of  in  recruit- 
ment, 380-385. 

Competitive  examination  system, 
efficiency  in,  446-452;  illustra- 
tions of  efficiency,  447-451. 

Competitive  service  defined  by 
Attorney-General,  497;  exam- 
inations for,  446-447;  recruit- 
ment methods  of,  378-454. 

Commissions  and  boards,  116-117; 
employees  of,  116-117. 

Committee  on  Reclassification. 
See  Reclassification  Commis- 
sion. 

Conditions,   working,   518-528. 

Conference  machinery  in  the 
British  Service,  566-569. 

Confidential  clerks,  1 17-120. 

Confidential    inspectors,    118. 

Congress,  attitude  of  an  area  of 
selection  within  the  civil  serv- 


ice, 274-275 ;  positions  created 
by,  185-193. 

Congressmen  and  political  inter- 
ference in  civil  service,   145-148. 

Consular  Service,  139-142;  ap- 
portionment and,  475;  board  of 
examiners  for,  472-474;  classi- 
fication of,  185 ;  examinations 
for,  473-476;  history  of,  471- 
472;  method  of,  474-475;  order 
of  President  Roosevelt,  472; 
politics  and,  473 ;  promotions 
within,  226-227 ;  recruitment 
for,  471-476. 

Control  of  personnel,  176-177. 


Demotion  and  dismissal,  liability 
to,  as  a  means  of  promoting  in- 
dividual efficiency,  492-495 ; 
control  of  power  of  removal, 
501-507;  difficulties  of,  493; 
existing  law  governing,  495- 
507;  politics  in,  493,  500; 
power  of,  493-495,  498;  pro- 
cedure of  dismissals,  495-499. 

Departmental  organization  for 
recruitment,  543. 

Departmental  service,  defined,  2. 

Detectives,  118-119;  of  New 
York,   119. 

Development  of  personnel  sys- 
tems, organization  of,  177-179; 
procedure  of,  175-176. 

Diplomatic  Service,  139-142;  ap- 
pointment to,  226;  career  in, 
142;  merit  principle  and,  477; 
merit  principle,  President  Taft 
on,  477;  method  of,  476-477; 
non-competitive  examinations, 
477;  order  of  President  Taft, 
476;  personnel,  permanent,  141- 
142;  politics  and,  226;  promo- 
tion within,   225-226. 

Dismissal,  liability  to,  as  a  means 
of  promoting  individual  effi- 
ciency, 492-495;  control  of 
power  of  removal,  495-499 ;  <iif " 
ficulties  of,  493;  existing  law 
governing,  495-507;  politics  in, 
493,  500;  power  of,  493-494, 
498;  procedure  of  dismissals, 
495-499- 


598 


INDEX 


Dismissal,  power  of,  493-405 ;  ad- 
ministrative review  of,  502; 
judicial  review  of,  501-502; 
machinery  for  control  of,  501- 
507;  trial  board  review  of,  502- 

Districts   of    field   positions,   382- 

385. 
Doty,    F.     E.,    on    psychological 
tests,  373n. 


Education  for  the  Civil  Service, 
American  Political  Science  As- 
sociation on,  351 ;  British  sys- 
tem, 346;  Columbia  University 
and,  351 ;  Consular  and  Diplo- 
matic Service,  350;  entrance, 
training  for,  351-353;  facili- 
ties for,  258-264 ;  foreign  serv- 
ice, education  in,  347;  New 
York  Bureau  of  Municipal  Re- 
search on,  351 ;  personnel,  reg- 
ular and,  346;  promotion  and, 
247,  252-255 ;  provided  how, 
346,  350-351;  recruitment  and, 
345-347;  special  fields,  require- 
ments in,  347-351 ;  standards, 
252-254;  tests  in,  367-369. 

Educational     facilities,    provision 
for  in  the  U.  S.,  258-264;  edu- 
cational      requirements,       263 
morale  and,  259;  private  educa 
tional     institutions     and,     264 
promotion   on,    260;   provisions 
for,    258-264;    Washington,    in 
260-261 ;    Washington,    outside 
of,     260-261 ;     working     hours 
and,  262. 

Educational  standards  in  the  Civil 
Service,  252-254. 

Educational  tests  in  recruitment, 
367-369;  difliculties  of,  368; 
schooling  and,  368;  State  De- 
partment and,  368. 

Efficiency,  maintenance  of,  indi- 
vidual, 480-517;  need  of  reputa- 
tion for,  509,  513 ;  promotion  of, 
481-495,   508-517. 

Efficiency  records,  321-332,  481- 
482;  administrative  discretion 
and,  322-323 ;  appeal  from  by 
employees,  right  of,  331;  Civil 


Service  Commission  on,  323 ; 
forms  of,  328-329;  National 
Civil  Service  Reform  League 
on*  335-336;  promotion  and, 
481-482;  Reclassification  Com- 
mission on,  325;  reliance  on, 
330;  review  of,  332;  trans- 
fers  and,   324;   uniformity   of, 

325- 
Eligible  registers,  404-406;  de- 
lay of,  404;  laborers  and,  467; 
non-publicity,  results  of,  442- 
443;  production  of,  404-406; 
publicity  of,  441-443;  rule   for, 

443- 

Elimination  of  politics  from  the 
Civil  Service,  537;  intervention 
of  politics,  prohibition  of,  148- 
i5i>  537;  within  the  service, 
144-167. 

Employment  manager,  need  of, 
177-179. 

Employees'  boards  and  commis- 
sions and,  116-117;  Bryan,  W. 
J.,  on  terms  of  office,  87;  con- 
tributions to  postal  campaign 
funds,  153-154;  Executive  or- 
der of  1918,  452-453;  Federal 
Farm  Loan  Board,  137;  in- 
ternal revenue  collector,  133- 
136;  laid  off  when,  452;  legal 
employees,  114-116;  political 
influence  on  employees  of  su- 
perior officers,  153-154;  postal 
employees  of  star  routes  and 
third  and  fourth  class  post  of- 
fices, 137-138;  prohibition  of 
political  influence  on,  155-160; 
protection  against  removal,  89- 
95;  reemployment  of,  452-453; 
removal  for  political  reasons 
of,  89-95 ;  rotation  in  office,  87, 
89-95 ;  tenure  of  office,  87,  9on ; 
term  of  office,  84-89. 

Employees'  committees,  561-562; 
composition  of,   569;    function, 

570. 

Employees'  Compensation  Com- 
mission, salaries  of,   182-184. 

Employees'  organization  and  com- 
mittees, 544-574;  act  of  1912, 
556;  activities  in  District  of 
Columbia,  554;  affiliations  with 


INDEX 


599 


other  organizations,  right  of, 
556-558;  American  Federation 
of  Labor,  546,  550-556;  compo- 
sition of  employees  committees, 
569;  conclusion  on,  559-561; 
dangers  of,  571-573;  employees' 
committees,  561  -  562 ;  Em- 
ployees' Retirement  Confer- 
ence, 553n;  existing  organiza- 
tions, 545-546;  Federal  Em- 
ployees' Unions,  545,  552 ;  func- 
tion of  employees'  committees, 
570;  Glassberg,  Benjamin,  on, 
547;  Great  Britain  and,  545, 
566;  history  of  political  activi- 
ties of,  437;  influence  in  Con- 
gress, 551 ;  Jordan,  Col.  H.  B., 
and,  562;  legislative  activities 
of,  546-556;  leaders  who  are 
federal  employees,  57^-573; 
Loud,  E.  F.,  on,  547 ;  machinery 
for  employees'  representation, 
562;  National  Federation  of 
Federal  Employees,  545,  560, 
574;  National  Federation  of 
Post  Office  clerks,  activities, 
550-551,  553-556;  personnel 
system,  government,  and,  559- 
561 ;  Picatinny  Arsenal  and, 
574;  political  activities,  pro- 
hibition of,  548-549 ;  Post  Office 
Clerks'  Federation,  550;  Re- 
classification Commission's  at- 
titude tow^ard  employees'  repre- 
sentation, 564-566;  representa- 
tives of  employees  before  man- 
agement, 571 ;  Rock  Island  Ar- 
senal, 563 ;  Roosevelt,  Presi- 
dent, on,  548;  San  Francisco 
Federal  Employees'  Union, 
552;  strike  rights,  558-559; 
United  Association  of  Post  Of- 
fice Clerks,  550. 
Employees'  representation,  562- 
564;  British  service  and,  566; 
compensation  of  committees, 
569;  danger  of,  571-573;  func- 
tions of  Employees'  Commis- 
sion, 570;  Jordan,  Col.  H.  B., 
and,  562;  leaders  who  are  not 
federal  employees,  571-573; 
machinery  for,  existing,  562; 
management,  representation  be- 


fore, 571 ;  Picatinny  Arsenal, 
574;  Reclassification  Commit- 
tee's attitude,  564-566;  Rock 
Island  Arsenal,   562. 

Employees'  retirement  confer- 
ence, 553n. 

Engineers,  civilian,  in  the  War 
Department,   234. 

England,  civil  service  in,  545 ; 
Conference     Committees,     566- 

569- 
Examination  for  the  civil  service, 
27-29;  advertising  of,  389-392; 
competitive,  28-29 ;  efficiency  of 
the  competitive  examination 
system,  446-452;  efficiency  of 
illustrations,  447-451 ;  exception 
and  exemptions  from,  60-73, 
96-143,  451 ;  exception  from 
formal  methods  of  selection,  74- 
80,  137;  exception  of,  for  vari- 
ous positions,  60-73 ;  extension 
of,  96-143;  fourth  class  post- 
masters, 398-404;  held  where, 
386-387;  individuals,  68-73;  in- 
formation of,  popular,  needed, 
390;  integrity  of,  safeguard- 
ing, 392-398;  New  York  Com- 
mission's experience  with,  392 ; 
ordered  how,  387-389;  pass  ex- 
aminations, 27-28;  personal,  ex- 
amination of,  531-536;  post- 
masters, fourth  class,  398-404; 
postmasters,  presidential,  sub- 
jects, for  examinations  of, 
456,  464n;  positions  excepted 
from,  60-73 ;  presidential  ex- 
ceptions, 68-71 ;  rules  and 
orders,  60-64;  rural  carriers, 
398-404 ;  statutory  exceptions, 
64-68;      unification      of,      388- 

389. 
Examination,  for  promotion,  332- 
337;  advantages  of,  333;  disad- 
vantages of,  333-334;  Reclassi- 
fication   Commission    on,    336- 

337- 
Examinations  for  recruitment,  as- 
sembled how,  358-361 ;  educa- 
tion tests,  367-369;  experience 
tests,  364-367;  for  the  foreign 
service,  358-360;  fully-as- 
sembled, 358;  locally-assembled. 


6oo 


INDEX 


organization    for, 


Civil 
468- 
469; 
469; 


360-361 ;  manual,  363-364 ;  non- 
assembled,  361 ;  oral  and  writ- 
ten, 361-363;  personality  tests, 
376-377;  psychological  tests, 
372-376;  technical  capacity 
tests,  369-372. 
Examinations,  non-competitive, 
468;  Civil  Service  Commission 
on,  468-471 ;  Newcomb,  H.  T., 
on,  469;  Roosevelt,  President, 
on,  469;  Twelfth  Census,  ap- 
plication to,  469;  Wright,  C. 
D.,  on,  469. 
Examinations, 

385-386. 
Examinations,  pass,  468 ; 
Service  Commission  on, 
471 ;  Hines,  F.  H.,  on, 
Newcomb,  H.  D.,  on, 
Twelfth  Census,  application 
to  personnel  for,  469-470; 
Roosevelt,  President,  on, 
469;  Wright,  Carroll  D.,  on, 
469. 
Examiner,  Chief  National   Bank, 

132-133- 

Examiner,  Chief,  of  the  Civil 
Service  Commission,   111-113. 

Examining  staff.  Coast  and  Geo- 
detic Survey,  536;  compensa- 
tion of,  534;  development  of, 
532;  inadequacy  of,  404-405; 
independent  and  departmental 
staffs,  532-534 ;  methods  of,  534- 
535 ;     Public     Health     Service, 

536. 

Exceptions  from  examinations  in 
the  Civil  Service,  60-73,  96-143, 
451;  in  Federal  Farm  Loan 
Board,  137;  list  of  positions 
excepted,   loi. 

Exemptions  from  examinations, 
96-143;  deputy  collector  and 
deputy  marshals  of  internal 
revenue,  135-136;  list  of  po- 
sitions  exempted,    loi. 

Experience  tests,  364-367;  chief 
examiner  on,  366-367;  classified 
service,    365 ;    foreign    service, 

365- 
Environment,    physical,    525-528; 
Reclassification  Commission  on, 
526-527. 


Federal  Employees'  Union,  545. 

Federal  Employees'  Union  of  San 
Francisco,  552 ;  see  also  em- 
ployees' organizations. 

Federal  Farm  Loan  Board,  field 
employees,  137. 

Federation  of  Federal  Employees, 
520;  and  overtime  work,  520. 

Field  employees  of  the  Federal 
Farm  Loan  Board,  137. 

Field  Service,  advantages  of 
transfer  to  Washington,  288- 
289;  chief  officers,  120-121 ;  list 
of,  120-121 ;  merit  system  and, 
124-126;  personnel  in,  133-139; 
transfers  to  Washington,  287- 
292. 
Foreign  Service,  139-142. 
Four-year  term,  123-124. 


Geodetic  and  Coast  Survey,  464- 
465  ;  recruitment  of,  464-465. 

Glassberg,  Benjamin,  on  political 
activities  of  federal  employees, 

547- 
Great    Britain,    civil    service    of, 

545,    566-569. 


Harding,  President,  and  the  merit 
system  in  the  postal  service, 
I32n. 

Heads  of  bureau  and  services, 
99-110;  and  political  appoint- 
ment, 100-102,  105;  tenure  of, 
100-102.  ^ 

Heads  of  departments,  96-98;  as 
administrators,  97;  as  political 
advisors,  97. 

Hours  of  Labor,  518-519. 


Increases  of  salary,  482-492. 

Independent  establishments,    96- 

98. 

Independent  examining      staffs, 

532-534- 
Individual  efficiency,  maintenance 
of,  480-517;  promotion  of,  481- 

495.   508,   517- 
Inspectors,   confidential,    118. 
Installation  of  classification,  206. 


INDEX 


6oi 


Internal  Revenue  Service  deputy 
collectors  and  deputy  marshals, 
^33-^36',  location  of  legal  power 
in  personnel,  matters  of,  151- 
152. 

International  Association  of 
Machinists,  55.  See  also  Em- 
ployees' Organizations. 


Johnson,  President,  and  the 
tenure  of  office  acts,  gon. 

Joint  Commission  on  Reclassifica- 
tion of  Salaries.  See  Reclassi- 
fication Commission. 

Jordan,  Colonel  Harry  B.  and 
employees'   representation,   562. 


Labor,  hours  of,  518-519. 

Labor  unions  of  civil  service  em- 
ployees. See  Employees'  Or- 
ganizations. 

Laborers  in  the  civil  service,  y^- 

74. 

Laborers,  recruitment  of,  465- 
471,  act  of,  1871,  466;  age 
limits,  466;  boards,  labor,  466; 
clerks  and,  465 ;  eligible  regis- 
ters, 467 ;  rating  of  labors,  467 ; 
recruitment  of,  465-471 ;  spoils 
system,  465 ;  Washington,  la- 
borers outside  of,  138-139. 

Law  clerks,   1 14-116. 

Laws.     See  Legislation. 

Leaves  of  absence,  521-525;  law 
pending,  522;  Reclassification 
Commission's  recommendations, 
524;  ruling  of  Comptroller  of 
Treasury,  522;  sick  leave,  523. 

Legal  basis  of  recruitment  meth- 
ods, 379-380. 

Legal  employees,  114-116. 

Legal  positions,  promotion  in, 
251-252. 

Legal  power  in  personnel  matter, 
151-154;  location  of,  151 -154. 

Legislation,  Acts  of  Congress,  41- 
43-54;  of  1853,  41;  of  1855,  41; 
of  1856,  41,  of  1871,  43-44;  of 

1883,  44-54. 

Legislative  determination  of  po- 
sitions and  salaries,  181-185. 


Local  civil  service  boards,  386. 

Longevity  pay.  See  Salary  In- 
creases. 

Loud,  E.  P.,  on  political  activi- 
ties of  federal  employees,   547. 

Lowell,  A.  L.,  on  employees' 
unions  in  Great  Britain,  546. 

Lump  sum,  appropriations  for 
salaries,  185-193;  example  of, 
186. 

Lyman,  Charles,  on  women  in  the 
civil  service,   17-18. 


MacVeagh,      Franklin,     on     the 

classified  service,   19. 
Manual     of     examinations,     363- 

364. 

Medical  services,  525-528;  Re- 
classification Commission  on, 
526-527. 

Meriam,  Lewis,  on  statistics  of 
employees,  8-1 1. 

Merit  basis  of  public  service,  510- 

Merit  system,  extension  of,  96- 
143;  Bonaparte,  C.  J.,  on,  115- 
116;  bureau  heads  and,  102; 
field  service,  124-126;  Harding, 
President  and,  126-128;  meth- 
ods of  extension,  103-107; 
Roosevelt,  President,  and,  128; 
Taft,  President,  on,  125-128; 
Wilson,  President,  and,  126- 
128. 

Methods  of  recruitment,  378-529. 

Military  preference  in  the  civil 
service,  406-413;  attorney-gen- 
eral on,  408;  act  of  July  11, 
1919,  409;  applies  to  what,  413; 
Civil  Service  Commission  on, 
410-413;  effects  of,  410-412; 
history  of,  407;  nature  of,  407- 
408;  procedure  in  determining, 
406-407. 

Minor  positions,  how  established, 
182. 


Nagel,  Charles,  on  formal  meth- 
ods of  promotion,  338-340. 

National  Bank  Examiner,  chief, 
132-133- 


6o2 


INDEX 


National  Civil  Service  Reform 
League,  on  the  Foreign  Service 
examinations,  359-360;  on  post- 
masterships,  230 ;  on  postmast- 
erships,  presidential,  459-460. 

National  Council  for  the  Admin- 
istrative and  Legal  Department 
in  Great  Britain,  568-569. 

National  Federation  of  Federal 
Employees,    116,    545-546,    560, 

574- 

National  Federation  of  Post  Of- 
fice Clerks,  550-551,  553-556. 
See  also  Employees'  Organiza- 
tions. 

Nationalization  of  the  civil  serv- 
ice, 291. 

Navy  Department,  233-234;  se- 
lection of   personnel   for,  233- 

234- 

Newcomb,  H.  T.,  on  pass  exam- 
inations, 469. 

New  York  Bureau  of  Municipal 
Research  and  training  for  the 
public  service,  351. 

Non-political  positions,  list  of, 
101-102. 


Oral  examinations,  361-363. 

Organization,  for  examining  and 
recruiting,  385-386. 

Organization  for  personnel  ad- 
ministration, 538-543 ;  advisory 
body  to,  537;  analysis  of  the 
problem,  529;  classification  of 
positions  and  salaries,  536-537; 
central  administration,  538-543 ; 
danger  in,  530;  examining  per- 
sonnel, 531-536;  physical  work 
conditions,  537;  political  con- 
siderations, elimination  of,  537; 
recruitment        and,        530-536, 

543- 

Organizations,  employees'.  See 
Employees'   Organizations. 

Overtime  work,  519-521  ;  law  gov- 
erning, 520;  weakness  of,  520- 
521. 


Patent    Office,    examining    force, 
?28;  promotion  within,  228. 


Pensions  in  the  civil  service,  ^2, 
87;  act  of  1920,  512;  procedure    ' 
of,  512. 

Periodical  increases  in  salary, 
482-492. 

Personality  tests,  376-377;  for 
what  positions,  Z7^-2>77  '■>  for 
presidential  postmasters,  377. 

Personnel  administration,  organ- 
ization for,  529-543;  advisory 
body  to,  537;  aim  and  scope  of, 
173-174;  analysis  of  the  prob- 
lem, 529;  central  administra- 
tion, 538-543;  danger  in,  530; 
employees'  organizations,  559; 
examining  staffs,  532-534;  fac- 
tors in,  special,  168-173;  in- 
ternal administration,  536;  per- 
sonnel in  Washington,  110-113; 
physical  conditions,  working, 
537;  political  considerations, 
elimination  of,  537. 

Personnel  committees,  565. 

Personnel  control,   176-177. 

Personnel   and  legal  power,    151- 

154- 
Personnel  manager,  need  of,  177- 

179. 
Personnel  problem,  dual  character 

of,  19-20. 
Personnel,     subordinate,     in     the 

field   service,    133-139;    list   of, 

not  in  the  competitive  service, 

133- 
Personnel     system,     development 
of,   174-176;   in  Great  Britain, 

254-255- 

Physical  environment,  525-528; 
Reclassification  Commission  on, 
526-528. 

Picatinny  Arsenal,  employees' 
representation  at,  574. 

Piece  work,  482. 

Political  activity  of  employees, 
160-167,  546-556;  activities  per- 
mitted, where,  i6in,  i63n;  ac- 
tivity, voluntary,  160-167; 
Civil  Service  Commission,  in- 
vestigation by,  162-164;  forms 
of,  162-164;  National  Federa- 
tion of  Federal  Employees,  166; 
restrictions  on,  158-167;  Roose- 
velt,    President,     on,     161-164. 


INDEX 


603 


See  also  Employees'  Organiza- 
tions. 

Political  appointees  and  non-po- 
litical appointees  in  the  federal 
service,  170,  172. 

Political  influence,  Civil  Service 
Commission  on,  313-314;  con- 
gressman and,  145-148;  diffi- 
culty of,  144-145;  factor,  20-25; 
elimination  of,  24-25,  144-167, 
305-306,  537;  employees,  influ- 
ence of  evils  of,  20-24;  superior 
officers  on,  154-155;  inside  the 
service,  144-167;  outside  the 
service,  116-117;  prohibition  of, 
148-151;  promotion  and,  312- 
316;     salary     increases,      153- 

154- 

Political  positions,  list  of,   loi. 

Position  specifications,  method  of 
determining,  197-200,  205-206; 
legal  determination  of,  205-206; 
scope  and  character  of,  200. 

Positions,  classification  and  stan- 
dardization of,  180-214;  admin- 
istrative determination  of,  185- 
193 ;  departmental  heads  and, 
185-193;  determination  of, 
method,  197-200,  205-206;  de- 
termination, legislative,  181- 
183 ;  information  regarding, 
need  of  popular,  390-392; 
minor  positions,  how  estab- 
lished, 182;  need  of,  183;  num- 
ber of,  183;  presidential  po- 
sitions, 185-193;  statutory  po- 
sitions,    185-193;     variety     of, 

183. 

Positions,  Postal  Service,  186- 
187;  clerical,  185-191 ;  Reclassi- 
fication Commission  on,  190- 
191 ;  technical  and  professional, 
191 ;  titles  of,  191-192. 

Postal  employees  of  star  routes 
and  third  and  fourth-class  post 
offices,   137-138. 

Postal  Service,  Civil  Service 
Commission,  231 ;  competitive 
examinations  and,  222 ;  merit 
system,  126-132;  politics  and, 
230-231 ;  positions  in,  peculi- 
arity of,  186-187;  promotions 
within,  222-233;  Roper,  D.  C, 


on,  257-258;  Wilson,  President, 
and,  229. 

Postmasters,  compensation  of, 
455;  number  of,  455. 

Postmasters,  fourth  class,  exam- 
ination of,  398-404;  President 
Roosevelt  and,  402;  procedure 
of,  402-403. 

Postmasters,  presidential,  454- 
463.  See  presidential  post- 
masters. 

Postmasterships  and  veteran 
preference,  461. 

Post  Office  clerks,  federal,  550. 
See  also  employees'  organiza- 
tions. 

Preference,  military,  406-413. 

Presidential  appointments,  29-40, 
99-113,  120-121,  123,  185-193; 
Congressional  power  over,  31- 
33;  list  of  positions,  33-37;  non- 
presidential    appointments,    40- 

4I-. 

Presidential  postmasters,  recruit- 
ment of,  454-463 ;  examination 
subjects,  464n;  National  Civil 
Service  Reform  League  on, 
459-460;  order  of,  1917,  454- 
455;  order  of  1920,  455;  order 
of  1921,  463n;  prerequisites  for, 
464n;  procedure,  461-463;  rat- 
ing, 458;  residence  require- 
ments, 455. 

Private  secretaries,  1 17-120. 

Probationary  period  in  recruit- 
ment, 444-446;  rule  for,  444; 
Reclassification  Commission  on, 
445-446. 

Procedure,  in  recruitment,  357- 
358.    . 

Professional      examining     staffs, 

532-534. 

Prohibition,  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission on,  158-160;  coercion 
prohibited,  159-160;  contribu- 
tions prohibited,  155-158;  inter- 
vention prohibited,  148-151 ; 
investigation  of,   156-158. 

Promotion,  administration  of- 
ficer, discretion  of,  304-305 ; 
British    personnel    system    and, 

1254-255 ;  central  restrictions 
on,  307-310;   civil  service  rule 


6o4 


INDEX 


on,  308;  in  clerical  positions, 
250;  departmental  restrictions 
on,  310-312;  Diplomatic  serv- 
ice, 225-226;  education  and, 
247,  252-254;  educational  facil- 
ities and,  260;  efficiency  rec- 
ords, 481 ;  examinations,  cler- 
ical competitive  for,  249-250 ; 
methods,  extent  of  formal, 
306;  methods,  need  of  formal, 
303-307;  methods,  existing, 
307-317;  natural  line  of,  222- 
223;  Patent  Office,  228;  poli- 
tics, exclusion  of,  305-306;  po- 
sitions barred  to  employees, 
99 ;  Postal  Service,  228-233 ; 
Public  Health  Service,  223- 
225 ;  restrictions  on  promotion 
in  Coast  and  Geodetic  Survey, 
Public  Health  and  Foreign 
Service,  309-312;  standard  of 
efficiency  for,  308;  statistical 
accounting  and  legal  positions, 
251-252;  stenographic  po- 
sitions, 250-251;  sub-clerical 
positions,  249-250;  technical 
positions,   252. 

Promotion  and  reassignment,  298- 
344;  distinguished  from  in- 
crease of  compensation,  298- 
299;  methods,  formal,  need  of, 
303-307 ;  reassignment  versus 
promotion,  299-300 ;  technical 
problem  of  promotion  methods, 
317-318. 

Promotion  from  within  the  serv- 
ice, 216-222;  area  of,  within 
the  service,  264-292 ;  "blind  al- 
leys," 246-248;  bureaucy  and, 
219-220;  control  of,  central, 
240-246;  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission on,  236-239,  271-274; 
Congress,  attitude  Of,  274-275 ; 
disadvantages  of  existing  re- 
strictions upon  transfers,  275- 
284;  direction  of  personnel 
from  outside  the  service,  218- 
219;  equalizing  opportunity  in, 
266;  England,  France,  and 
Germany,  219-220;  limitations 
of  natural,  267;  objections  to, 
217-219;  positions  not  in  the 
natural    line    of,    246-254;    re- 


assignment and,  267-268;  Re- 
classification Commission,  239- 
240;  rules  governing,  242-243; 
stagnation  and,  268;  transfers 
from  departments,  270-273 ; 
transfer  from  field  to  Wash- 
ington, 269-270.  See  also  se- 
lection. 

Promotion  methods,  318-344;  ad- 
ministration of,  342-344;  Civil 
Service  Commission  on  effi- 
ciency records,  323 ;  combination 
of  methods  of,  337-338;  com- 
petitive examination,  332-337; 
efficiency  record,  method  of, 
321-332;  efficiency  record  and 
administration  discretion,  322- 
323;  Nagel,  Charles,  on,  338- 
340;  seniority  method  of,  318- 
321 ;  special  personnel  to  ad- 
minister, 342-344;  summary  of 
methods,  338-344. 

Proportional  representation  of 
the  states  in  Federal  service, 
171. 

Public  Health  Service,  appoint- 
ment to,  223 ;  civilian  status, 
1-2;  medical,  478-479;  promo- 
tion in,  223-225 ;  recruitment 
of  officers,  471-479;  scientific 
personnel  in,  225. 

Public  Service  advancement  in, 
opportunity  for,  511-517;  at- 
tractiveness of,  508-510;  entry 
to,  170-171 ;  merit  basis,  510- 
511;  prestige  of,  509;  security 
of,  510. 

Psychological  tests,  372-376 ; 
alpha  test,  374;  Civil  Service 
Commission  experience  with, 
373-376 ;  Doty,  F.  E.,  on,  373n ; 
in  industries,  372;  for  what 
positions,   374. 


Quasi-military  service,  i. 


Rates,  compensation,  193-195; 
440-441  ;  discretion  in  fixing, 
for  entrance,  440-441;  legal 
determination  of,  205-206; 
maximum  and  minimum,  205. 


INDEX 


605 


Rating  for  laborers,  469;  for 
presidential  postmasters,  458; 
re-rating,  406. 

Reassignment  and  promotion, 
215,  298-344;  advantage  of, 
302;  distinguished  from  in- 
crease of  compensation,  298- 
299,  300-303 ;  promotion  versus 
reassignment,  299-300 ;  reas- 
signment with  no  change  of 
compensation    or    grade,    300- 

303- 

Reclassification  Commission,  ap- 
propriation for,  196;  assistance 
of,  technical,  196-197;  civil 
service,  positions  in,  190-191 ; 
194-195;  class,  defined,  200; 
composed  of  w^hom,  195;  func- 
tioned w^hen,  196;  hours  of 
labor,  518;  methods  of  deter- 
mining position  specifications, 
197-200;  organization  of,  196- 
197;  promotion  within  the 
service,  attitude  of  toward, 
239-240 ;  salary  increases,  rec- 
ommendations regarding,  490- 
492;  series  defined  and  ar- 
ranged, 202-203 ;  services  de- 
fined and  arranged,  202-203 ; 
transfers,  attitude  toward,  re- 
striction of,  276n,  284-286; 
work  of,  195-214. 

Records,  efficiency,  481-482;  and 
promotion,  481. 

Recruitment,  probationary  period 
in,  444-446;  and  promotion, 
215-297. 

Recruitment  methods,  345-479 ; 
basic  aspects,  345-377;  of 
classified  competitive  service, 
378-454;  legal  basis  of,  379- 
380. 

Recruitment,  organization  for, 
530-536;  danger  in,  530;  de- 
partmental, 543 ;  independent 
body,  540. 

Reemployment  of  employees,  452- 
453;  when  laid  off,  452;  exec- 
utive    order     of      1918,     452- 

453- 
Registers    of    eligibles     for    the 
civil  service,  404-406;  delay  of, 
404;    labor,   467;    publicity    of. 


441-443;  non-publicity  results, 
442-443;  rule  for,  443. 

Removal,  power  of,  493-495;  ad- 
ministrative review  of,  502; 
judicial  review  of,  501-502; 
machinery  for  control  of,  501- 
507;  trial  board  review  of,  502- 
505. 

Removal  of  officers,  102-103. 

Representation,  employees,  562- 
564;  British  Service,  556; 
composition  of  employees'  com- 
mittees, 569;  danger  of,  571- 
573;  functions  of  employees' 
commissions,  579;  Jordan,  Col. 
H.  B.,  on,  562;  leaders  not  fed- 
eral employees,  571-573;  ma- 
chinery for,  existing,  562;  at 
Picatinny  Arsenal,  574;^  Re- 
classification Commission's  at- 
titude, 564-566 ;  representation 
before  management,  571 ;  at 
Rock  Island  Arsenal,  562. 

Re-rating,  appeals  for,  406. 

Residence  requirements,  381-382; 
of      presidential      postmasters, 

455- 

Retirement.     See  pensions. 

Rock  Island  Arsenal,  employees' 
representation  at,  562. 

Roper,  Daniel  C,  on  the  Postal 
Service,   257-258. 

Roosevelt,  President,  and  the 
Consular  Service,  472 ;  and  ex- 
aminations for  the  Postal 
Service,  402;  and  the  merit 
system,  128;  and  political  ac- 
tivities of  federal  employees, 
161,  164,  548.  , 

Rural  carriers,  examination  of, 
398-404;  "three  name"  rule  ap- 
plied to,  431-432. 

Rural  Carriers'  Association.  See 
Employees'   Organizations. 


Salaries,  classification  and  stan- 
dardization of,  180-214;  ad- 
ministrative determination  of, 
185-193;  Employees'  Compen- 
sation Commission,  182-184; 
legislative  determination  of, 
181-185;  need  of,  180-181, 


6o6 


INDEX 


Salary  increases,  periodic,  482- 
492;  automatic  and  semi-auto- 
matic, 483 ;  Coast  and  Geodetic 
Survey,  485-486;  effect  of,  491 ; 
methods  of,  490-491 ;  Patent 
Office,  488-489;  Postal  Service, 
486-488;  Public  Health  Serv- 
ice, 485-486;  Reclassification 
Commission's  recommendations, 
490-492 ;  statutory  position, 
489;  theory  of,  483. 

Salary  increases  and  politics,  153- 

Scope  of  personnel  administra- 
tion, 173-174-. 

Secretaries,  assistant,  and  analo- 
gous officers,  98-99. 

Selection  for  the  civil  service, 
26-54 ;  exceptions  from  formal 
method  of  selection,  14-80;  ex- 
tension of  formal  systems  of, 
96-143;  legislation  for,  41-54; 
recruitment  and,  215-297;  sta- 
tistics of  employees  according 
to  method  of  selection  status, 
80-84;  systems  of,  26-29;  tradi- 
tion in  selection,  81-84. 

Selection  from  within  the  serv- 
ice, act  of  1912,  on,  295;  ap- 
portionment principle,  293-294; 
appropriation  and  statutory 
positions,  295-297;  competitive 
and  excepted  positions,  292- 
293 ;  promotion  and  reassign- 
ment, 298-344;  technical  ob- 
stacles to,  292-298. 

Senate,  advice  and  consent  in 
civil  service  appointments,  103; 
abolition  of,   103. 

Seniority  in  promotion,  318-321; 
advantages  of,  319-320;  evils 
of,  320. 

Series  of  classes  of  positions, 
202-203 ;  defined  and  arranged, 
202-203. 

Services  defined  and  classified, 
202-203. 

Sick  leave,  523 ;  cumulative,  524- 
525;  Reclassification  Commis- 
sion's recommendations,  524 ; 
statistics  of,  524-525. 

Smithsonian  Institution,  113;  of- 
ficials of,   113. 


Soldiers,  National  Home  for  Dis- 
abled Volunteer,  113;  man- 
agers of,   113. 

Solicitors     of     the     departments, 

IIO-III. 

Special  agents,  118. 

Specialized  education  required, 
347-351  ;  in  Consular  and  Dip- 
lomatic service,  350;  how  pro- 
vided, 350-351- 

Specifications  of  positions, 
method  of  determining,  197- 
200,  205-206;  legal  determina- 
tion, 205-206;  scope  and  char- 
acter of,  200. 

Standardization  of  positions  and 
salaries,  180-214;  adminis- 
trative determination,  185-193; 
legislative  determination,  180- 
185;  need  of,   180- 181. 

Standards,  educational,  in  the 
civil   service,  252-254. 

Statistical  positions,  promotions 
in,  251-252. 

Statistics  of  employees,  8-12,  80- 

84- 
Statutory   positions,    181-185. 

Statutory  roll,   181-185. 

Stenographic  positions,  promo- 
tions in,  250-251. 

Stewart,  Luther  C,  on  relations 
of  federal  employees  with  the 
American  Federation  of  Labor, 
5.S6n. 

Stratification  of  civil  service,  248. 

Sub-clerical  positions,  promo- 
tion in,  249-250;  competitive 
examination  for  promotion, 
249-250;  President  Cleveland 
on,  249. 

Suspension,  power  of,  507-508; 
as  a  means  of  providing  indi- 
vidual efficiency,  507-508. 


Taft,  President,  and  the  merit 
svstem,  125-129;  on  tenure  of 
office,  87-88. 

Technical  capacity  tests,  369- 
372 ;  Civil  Service  Commission, 
372;  for  Consular  and  Diplo- 
matic Service,  372;  classes  of, 
370. 


INDEX 


607 


Technical  positions,  promotion  in, 
251-252. 

Tenure  of  heads  of  bureaus  and 
services,   100-102. 

Tenure  of  office  acts,  9on ;  Presi- 
dent Johnson  and,  Qon. 

Titles  of  positions,  191,  193-195. 

Training  for  the  civil  service, 
351-353;  American  Political 
Science  Association  on,  351 ; 
Columbia  University  and,  351 ; 
New  York  Bureau  of  Munici- 
pal Research,  351. 

Transfers,  advantages  of  inter- 
change of  field  service  and 
Washington,  288-289 !  depart- 
mental transfers,  270-273 ;  dis- 
advantages of  existing  restric- 
tions upon,  275-284;  eligibles 
for,  absence  of,  means  for  lo- 
cating, 286;  field  service  to 
Washington,  269-270,  287-292; 
morale,  effect  on,  289-290;  na- 
tionalization of  the  service  by, 
291 ;  politics  and,  290. 

Transfers,  restriction  upon,  275- 
281 ;  act  of  1912  on,  283-284, 
295;  act  of  1917  on,  279; 
agencies  and,  new,  275;  au- 
thority for,  281 ;  Civil  Service 
Commission  on,  277-278;  com- 
petitive class,  275;  Depart- 
mental, 276-277;  disadvantages 
of,  275-284;  employees,  mo- 
tives of,  277;  important  restric- 
tions, 278-279;  mobility  of  serv- 
ice and,  284;  Reclassification 
Commission  on,  276n,  284-286; 
Secretary  of  Commerce  and 
Labor  on,  280-282;  War,  dur- 
ing the,  283. 


Unclassified  service,  recruitment 
methods,  454-479. 

Uniformity  in  titles  and  compen- 
sation rates,  193-195;  lack  of, 
193-195- 

Unions,  employees,  554-574.  See 
also  "Employees'  Organiza- 
tions." 

United  Association  of  Post  Office 
Clerks,  550.  See  also  Em- 
ployees' Organizations. 

Universities  and  the  civil  service 
examinations  in  England,  255. 


Vacancies,  benefit  of,  512-514; 
causes  of,  511-514,  517;  disad- 
vantages of,  514;  by  whom 
filled,  516. 

Veteran  preference  and  postmas- 
terships,  451. 


War  Department,  233-234;  civ- 
ilian engineers  in,  234-235; 
selection  of  personnel  for,  233- 

234. 
Washington,    personnel    in,    iio- 

113;   subordinate  personnel   in, 

1 13-120. 
Wilson,  President,  and  the  merit 

system,  126-131 ;  and  the  postal 

service  examinations,  229. 
Women,  recruitment  of,  355-357; 

discrimination      against,      356; 

elimination    of     discrimination, 

356-357- 

Working  conditions,  518-528. 

Wright,  C.  D.,  on  pass  examina- 
tions, 469. 

Written  examinations,  361-363. 


^EP 


UNIVERSITY  of  CALIFORN 
AT 
LOS  ANGELES 
LIBRARY 


of 


■111 


3  1158  00691  0870     ' 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


AA    001  182  993    4 


•--cEcis'nrfflty^tfteajtafflnS 

^^gs 

9 

^^^1 

■ 

^^^^^^^^^^1 

1 

i 

u 


